Milestones of Science Books

BOYLE, Robert.

Some Motive and Incentives to the Love of God, Pathetically Discours'd of in a Letter to a Friend. The Eighth Edition, Corrected.

London: Printed by Edw Jones, for Henry Herringman, 1700.

8th Edition. Hardcover. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. Very Good. Item #002504

8vo (181 x 118 mm). [16], 174 pp. Signatures: A-M8. Including frontispiece portrait of the author on A1v. Contemporary blind stamped calf (foot of spine damaged, extremities, boards and spine rubbed, corners bumped). Internally browned and spotted throughout (last page stronger), a few contemporary text markings, minor worming to lower blank margin. Provenance: Ric Booth (inscribed on front pastedown and dated 1700); The library of Hugh Selbourne (small ink stamp to half-title verso and p.51). Good, wide-margined copy. ----

Fulton 8. Eighth Edition, very rare with the engraved frontispiece (Fulton does not mention it and speculates whether A1 is a blank). Boyles first separate work. The type of this edition is entirely reset from the previous. Known under the title "Seraphick Love" from the running head used in all 17th -century English editions, it did not find a place on the title-page until the 1693 Latin edition (see Fulton, p.2). Though perhaps as little known as any of Robert Boyle's numerous writings, there is much interest attaching to this work, as well as something of a romance in his life. By 1752, the work had been carried through fifteen English editions or variants. The text was written by Boyle when he was but 22 years old and is in the form of a letter addressed to Lindamor, 'a learned youth, well-born and well-bred.' It was suggested that this imaginary character, who appears in a number of Boyle's writings, was in fact no other than Boyle himself. (Fulton, p.3).

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