Rene Descartes; Louis Elzevir [printer]

Renati Des Cartes Meditationes De Prima Philosophia, In quibus Deis existentia, & animae humanae a corpore distinctio, demonstrantur [Two Volumes in One]

Amstelodami [Amsterdam]: Apud Ludovicum Elzevirium [Louis Elzevier], 1650. Very Good. Item #47549

Amstelodami [Amsterdam]: Apud Ludovicum Elzevirium, 1650. Tertia editio prioribus auctior & emendatior. Quarto (20cm); 18th-century maroon morocco over marbled paper-covered boards, elaborate gilt spine in six compartments, marbled endpapers; [12],168,191pp. (collated complete, but please see note); woodcut publisher's Minerva emblem on title page, woodcut initials throughout. Some scuffing to extremities with brief exposure at corners, else a Very Good, internally fresh and sound example.

The second volume issued with the title page "Appendix, Continens Obiectiones Quintas & Septimas in Renati Des-Cartes Meditationes," Amstelodami: Apud Ludovicum Elzevirium, 1649.

The third edition of Descarte's Meditations on First Philosophy, published shortly after his death in February, 1650. The contents include his six Meditations as well as the seven objections from the author's contemporaries, each followed by his response.

This copy is a bibliographical peculiarity, the pagination and collation differing from all the other copies described in OCLC, Willems, and Library Hub. The standard pagination for all other copies of this third edition (and the four subsequent Elzevier editions that followed) is: [12],191,164, usually followed by the 88pp. Epistola, with a collational formula: *4 **2 A-Z4 Aa4 a-v4 x2 aa-ll4.

This copy is issued without the Epistola and the pagination and collation are otherwise nearly identical, but in a different order: *4 2*2 A-X4 a-v4 x2 Y-2A4. According to the bibliographical listing of the copy at St. Andrew's, "The Elzevirs printed Descartes' philosophical works in quarto format six times between 1644 and 1677, and the parts of each ed. were sold together and separately, in many different combinations." However, this does not explain away the inconsistencies in the pagination or why there are no other examples that conform to this collation. A curious example, worthy of further research.

See Willems 1107, describing this as the first edition in quarto format.

Price: $1,500.00