
WING
BOOKS
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The great WING BIBLIOGRAPHY of books printed in Great Britain and British America, and English-language books printed in other countries, covers the years
16411700. |

Anatomy & Therapeutics as Taught on the Continent,
NOW for the English Medical Audience
Beckher, Daniel. Medicus microcosmus, seu, Spagyria microcosmi exhibens medicinam corpore hominis tùm vivo, tùm extincto doctè eruendam, scitè praeparandam, & dextrè propinandam. Londini: Prostant apud Jo. Martin, Ja. Allestry & Tho. Dicas, 1660. 12mo (13.5 cm, 5.25"). [16] ff., 304 pp., [12] ff.
$1250.00
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Born in Gdansk, Beckher (1594–1655) studied at several universities (Marburg, Heidelberg, Wittenberg, and Rostock) and eventually received an appointment as a professor of medicine at the University of Konigsberg. A steadfast follower of Paracelsus' teachings, he perhaps had blinders on regarding medical advances of the late 16th and early 17th century. Nonetheless, his Medicus microcosmus, first published in 1622 at Rostock as Spagyria microcosmi, tradens medicinam, e corpore hominis tùm vivo, tùm extincto doctè eruendam, scitè praeparandam, & dextrè propinandam, was a popular and widely used text of anatomy and therapeutics, as attested to by its having been reprinted several times on the Continent in the period to 1660.
This is the sole printing in England of any of Beckher's writings, here described as “Editio nova triplo auctior & correctior.”
Provenance: 20th-century bookplate of A. Garrigues, D.M. Most recently in the residue of the stock of the F. Thomas Heller bookselling firm (est. ca. 1928).
Searches of NUC, ESTC, and WorldCat surprisingly locate only seven U.S. libraries (DNLM, NN [incomplete copy], CU-M, WU, PCarlD, NNOD, MiU) reporting ownership. Notably absent from that list are Harvard, Yale, the Huntington, New York Academy of Medicine, the College of Physicians, University of Texas, and the Folger.
ESTC R14791; Wing (rev. ed.) B1655. Mid-19th-century quarter leather with marbled paper sides; front board expertly reattached and leather refurbished. Age-toning, notably to first leaves including title; discoloration in gutter margins from transference from leather (?).
A good copy of a scarce English medical imprint. (39767)

First
Folio Greek N.T. Printed in England
Bible. N.T. Greek. 1642. Jesu Christi Domini Nostri Novum Testamentum, sive Novum Foedus, cujus Græco contextui respondent interpretationes duæ: una, vetus; altera, Theodori Bezæ.... Cantabrigiae: Ex officina Rogeri Danielis, 1642. Folio (37.5 cm, 14.5"). [8], [10] ff., 766 (i.e., 764) pp., [12] ff., 125, [1 (blank)] pp., [2], [1 (blank)] ff.
$800.00
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In 1565 Theodore Beza (1519–1605, also de Bèsze or Bèze), Calvin's chief assistant and successor as leader of his reform movement, first published his edition of the Greek New Testament with the Vulgate and his own Latin translation. For the edition of 1582, he revised his text based on the discovery of the important Codex Bezae (Codex D), a manuscript of the Gospels and Acts probably written in the 5th century and the principal witness to the Western textual tradition of the New Testament. Beza personally owned this codex and presented it to Cambridge University in 1581.
This is the first folio edition of the Greek New Testament to be printed in England as well as the
first Greek–Latin edition of Beza's New Testament to be printed there. It is also considered by the ODCC to be the best edition of Beza's Latin translation of the New Testament. The text is based on Beza's fourth (and last) edition of 1598 and includes his annotations. Joachim Camerarius's commentary on the New Testament is appended at the end with its own sectional title-page and pagination.
Handsomely printed with an
engraved printer's device on the title-page by Wenceslas Hollar and woodcut initials, head- and tailpieces, this edition has the text in three parallel columns (Greek, Beza's Latin version, and the Vulgate) with a wealth of commentary above and below. The title-page exists in three states: the present one is printed in black only and lists the print-shop of Roger Daniel without “Londini venales prostant.”
Provenance: 1710 ownership signature of “R. Holde[----?].” Later in the library of American collector Albert A. Howard, small booklabel (“AHA”) at rear.
Wing (rev.) 2728A; ESTC R35303; Darlow & Moule 4686; not in Rumball-Petre, Rare Bibles. On Beza, see: Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church 166–67. On the Western text of the N.T., see: Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church 1470–71. Contemporary Dutch-style vellum over pasteboards with central blind-stamped medallion on both boards within a blind double-rule frame; vellum split along front joint (outside) and peeling at top and bottom of spine. Evidence of silk ties. Title-leaf with dust-soiling and discoloration at inner margin; dust-soiling and light water- or dampstaining variably elsewhere. Overall a sound, decent copy. (40055)

Printed in England in 1665 & Bound in
AMERICA in 1829
Bible. O.T. Greek. Septuagint. 1665. [four lines in Greek, then] Vetus testamentum graecum ex versione Septuaginta interpretum, juxta exemplar Vaticanum Romae editum. Cantabrigiae: Excusum per Joannem Field, 1665. 12mo (14 cm; 5.5"). [1] f., 19, [1], 755 [i.e. 767, 1], 516 pp. (without the initial blank).
$1800.00
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The second English edition of the Septuagint. There are different issues: This a copy of the one with the third word of the Greek title readiing “Diathēche” and not “Diathēke” and with the printer's device showing the man holding the sun in his left hand. Thus, this is Darlow and Moule issue “B.”
Thomas Jefferson owned a copy of one of the issues of this edition.
Provenance: Manuscript ownership inscription of John Ray dated 1716 (on retained fly-leaf); ownership signature of Robert L. Wilson, New York, 1818 (on title-page); gilt supra-libros of Barzillai Slosson, dated 1829. Later in the Howell Bible Collection, Pacific School of Religion (properly released).
Binding: American binding of dark blue goat, richly gilt, with wide floral border on covers and spine distinctively gilt using rules and floral roll. Board edges with a gilt roll; turn-ins gilt tooled. Marbled endpapers. All edges gilt. Gilt supra-libros of Barzillai Slosson as above. Unsigned.
Barzillai Slosson may have been related to the lawyer of the same name who was active in Kent, CT, at the end of the 18th century and into the fourth decade of the 19th, whose account books are in the Yale Law Library; perhaps, the Barzillai who graduated from Columbia College in 1818 and later moved to Geneva, NY, where he was active and successful in business and civic affairs.
Wing (rev. ed.) B2719. Darlow & Moule; 4702; ESTC R236848; Sowerby, Catalogue of the library of Thomas Jefferson, 1473. Binding as above, lightly rubbed. Pages closely cropped in the 19th-century rebinding and some initial or final letters touched or lost. Very good. (34786)

“You desire mine opinion . . . ”
B[lake], T[homas]. A moderate ansvver to these two questions. 1. Whether ther [sic] be sufficient ground in Scripture to warrant the conscience of a Christian to present his infants to the sacrament of baptism. 2. Whether it be not sinfull for a Christian to receiv [sic] the sacrament in a mixt assembly. London: Printed by I.N. for Abel Roper, at the signe of the Sunne over against S. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street, 1645 [i.e., 1644]. 4to. [2], 32 pp.
$400.00
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“Prepared for the resolution of a friend, and now presented to the publick view of all, for the satisfaction of them who desire to walk in the ancient and long-approved way of truth and holiness.”
ESTC R12103; Wing (rev. ed.) B3148. Removed from a nonce volume, edges speckled red; spine reinforced with archival tape. Ex-library with some pencillings and perforation- and rubber-stamps. Worming to last leaves, entirely within gutter margins; light waterstaining. (25705)

Leveller-Inspired Pamphlet: Get Rid of the Greedy Cheaters
Cole, William. A rod for the lawyers: Who are hereby declared to be the grand robbers & deceivers of the nation; greedily devouring yearely many millions of the peoples money. London: Giles Calvert, 1659. 4to (18.2 cm, 7.2"). [4], 16 pp.
$1250.00
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First edition of this attack on professional lawyers and, on a larger scale, on general legal injustices as practiced by the ruling class against the commons. Cole, a self-professed lover of his country, added “a Word to the Parliament; and a Word to the Army” to this scathing diatribe against “this pestiferous Generation of the Lawyers [which] runs from City to Countrey, seeking whom they may devour” (p. [iii]).
Uncommon: ESTC and WorldCat locate only three U.S. institutional holdings of this edition. A variant, lacking publisher information, was printed in the same year; the present example bears three woodcut headpieces and one foliated capital.
ESTC R29637; Wing (rev. ed.) C5039A. Removed from a nonce volume, with early inked pagination added in upper outer corners. Final leaf with lower outer corner torn away, not nearing text; slim track of worming to lower inner leaf portions, not obscuring text and with unobtrusive translucent repairs to several instances.
A very nice copy of this uncommon polemic. (36844)

The Muse of Poetry Holds “Unbounded Power” over
Time & Fame
Congreve, William. The birth of the muse. London: Jacob Tonson, 1698 [i.e., 1697]. Folio (32.2 cm, 12.7"). [2], 10 pp.
$625.00
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Congreve's tribute to poetical greatness as inspired by political accomplishment. Dedicated to Charles Montagu, first Earl of Halifax, a statesman and poet, this piece was written in honor of Montagu's appointment as First Lord of the Treasury. This is the
first edition; ESTC notes the actual printing date as 1697.
Provenance: Front pastedown with bookplate of Spencer van Bokkelen Nichols.
ESTC R29682; Pforzheimer 193; Wing (rev. ed.) C5845. Later plain paper-covered limp boards; paper darkened and chipped. Front pastedown with bookplate as above, front free endpaper with affixed slip of old cataloguing offset onto pastedown. Pages age-toned and cockled with margins slightly darkened; last two leaves with holes affecting text, final leaf with loss of about 14 words and penultimate with only a handful of letters touched. Lower edge with one chip throughout. A flawed, but moderately uncommon, first edition from one of the most popular playwrights of the Restoration era. (33587)
Cowley, Abraham. The works...consisting of those which were formerly printed: and those which he design’d for the press, now published out of the authors original copies. The fourth edition. London: Henry Herringman (pr. by J.M.), 1674. Folio (30 cm, 11.8"). πa–c4B–Z4Aa–Zz4Aaa 211;Ccc4Ddd2A–S4T2; frontis., [42], 41, [1 (blank)], 80, [4], 70 (59/60 skipped in pagination, text uninterrupted), 154, 23, [1 (blank)], 148 pp.
$875.00
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Fourth edition of Cowley’s collected poems, beginning with a good impression of the frontispiece portrait engraved by Faithorne, “an account of the life and writings” of the poet signed by T. Spratt, and two odes on Cowley’s death by Thomas Higgons and Sir John Denham. Once considered the epitome of his era’s wit, the author of The Mistress (verses in honor of love and various women, included in this volume) suffered a notable decline in popularity in subsequent years, prompting Pope’s musing “Who now reads Cowley? . . . but still I love the language of his heart.” And indeed despite the vagaries of reputation he has always had his worthy appreciators.
Cowley’s Pindaric odes are present here, as are the Davideis and Davideidos; also set forth are the “delightful little prose Essays (with verse interwoven)” for which The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature believes Cowley will most ultimately be remembered. Some sections have separate title-pages, bearing the same publisher and date information as the main title-page but lacking the printer attribution.
Provenance: Front pastedown with small armorial bookplate and with bookseller’s ticket from Cambridge, England.
ESTC R29730; Wing (2nd ed.) C-6652. On Cowley, see: Concise Cambridge History of English Literature, 351–52. 17th-century mottled calf, rebacked at some point in the 19th century and again more recently with hinges carefully reinforced (inside); spine gilt extra with gilt-stamped leather title label, covers showing the predictable acid-etching. Varying degrees of browning to pages; scattered incidents of worming in lower inner and outer margins, almost never affecting text.
A handsome book in a binding both sturdy and attractive. (7716)
For ENGLISH LITERATURE, click here.

The House Explains & Condemns the Rebellion of 1641
England & Wales. Parliament. House of Commons. A declaration of the Commons assembled in Parliament concerning the rise and progresse of the grand rebellion in Ireland. Together with a multitude of examinations of persons of quality, whereby it may easily appear to all the world, who were, and still are the promoters of that cruell and unheard of rebellion. London: Printed for Edw. Husbands, 1642. 4to (19 cm, 7.5"). 63 pp.
$1000.00
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The Irish rebellion of 1641 is nicely explained on the Trinity College Dublin library website (http://1641.tcd.ie/historical-rebellion.php). Thousands of English and Scottish settlers were dispossessed during the uprising; many of those who fled to Dublin for safety were interviewed by crown authorities and their depositions taken. This publication contains abstracts of some of those eyewitness testimonies, as well as the House's reasoning on the cause of the rebellion and a short narrative of its early months, the latter with considerable emphasis on
naval operations.
ESTC R4373; Wing (rev. ed.) E2557. Quarter red morocco with French-swirl marbled paper sides and gilt spine lettering; binding signed (with small rubber-stamp on verso of front free endpaper) by the Macdonald Company of New York. Leather of joints lightly rubbed in places. Very good condition. (37991)

Establishing
PRIVATEERS to Aid in Quelling the Irish Rebellion
England & Wales. Parliament. An ordinance and declaration of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament. Allowing and authorizing any of his Majesties good and loyall subjects in the kingdome of England, to furnish with all manner of warlike provision, and send to sea what ships and pinnaces they shall thinke fit, to make stay of all such supplyes as they shall seize upon by sea or land, going to assist the rebels in Ireland. London: Printed for John Wright, 1642. 4to (19 cm, 7.5"). [8] pp.
$950.00
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First edition. This ordinance made provision for privateers to hinder aid reaching the Irish during the Rebellion of 1641, although the rebellion wasn't entirely quelled until Cromwell's New Model Army reconquered Ireland in 1653. The war was almost certainly the most destructive in Irish history, and its abiding legacy was the wholesale transfer of land ownership and political power from the old Catholic elite to a Protestant one, in part newly installed and in part pre-existing the war. The publisher of this wartime proclamation was an official printer for the Parliament of England, and published several early newspapers and ballads.
ESTC R19001; Wing (rev. ed.) E1765. Quarter red morocco with French-swirl marbled paper sides and gilt spine lettering; binding signed (with small rubber-stamp on verso of front free endpaper) by the Macdonald Company of New York. Leather of joints rubbed. Very good condition. (37985)
BIBLIOGRAPHICALLY INTERESTING, ALSO
England & Wales. Parliament. An ordinance of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament, for giving power to all the classicall presbyteries within their respective bounds to examine, approve, and ordaine ministers for severall congregations. London: Pr. for John Wright, 1645. Small 4to. [1] f., 6 pp.
$450.00
A parliamentary action on ordination: The ordinance sparked some controversy immediately and there was at least one immediate publication that examined its import.
Bibliographically interesting. Wing records four different issues of this ordinance, the telling points being on the title-page: the spelling of “classical” or “classicall” and the form of the date, whether “12 Novemb., 1645,” or just “1645" and combinations thereof. ESTC fails to distinguish them.
Wing (rev. ed.) E1894A; ESTC R176130. Removed from a nonce volume and dusty; in modern wrappers. All edges a bit chipped and lower margins of leaves A2 and A3 with loss of blank paper. All leaves age-toned. (20454)

The Great Puritan: His Wars & Politics
Fletcher, Henry. The perfect politician: or, A full view of the life and actions (military and civil) of
O. Cromwel. Whereunto is added his character; and a compleat catalogue of all the honours conferr’d by him on several persons. London: printed by J. Cottrel, for William Roybould at the Unicorn, and Henry Fletcher at the three Gilt Cups in St Paul’s Church-yard, 1660. Small 8vo (13.5 cm; 5.25"). [4] ff., 459 [i.e., 359, [1] pp., port. in facsimile.
[SOLD]
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Published anonymously and often attributed to Fletcher and occasionally to William Raybould, this is one of three editions printed in 1660, the first year of the work's printing. It sometimes later appeared under the variant title A Full View of the Life and Actions (military and civil) of Oliver Cromwel.
In addition to telling of Cromwell's political life and his wars in Ireland, Scotland, and England, this offers a section on the Protectorate that has much to say about his policies and military actions in the Caribbean, especially the taking of
Jamaica from Spain.
The title-page is printed in black and red and this copy retains the vertical half-title on A1r, “O. Cromwel’s Life.”
Provenance: Pacific School of Religion (properly deaccessioned).
ESTC R18473; Wing (rev. ed.) F1334. 19th-century quarter leather, binding much rubbed and abraded; portrait supplied in facsimile. Age-toned; title-leaf and another leaf with an old cello-tape repair and resulting staining, last leaf torn in upper outer corner with small loss of a few letters. Top margins of some leaves trimmed with loss of page numbers and running heads; other leaves trimmed into heads and pages numbers.
Doodlings to blank areas, and the book priced for its faults though the doodles have their charms! (36184)
For “EVIDENCE of READERSHIP,” click here.

The Ill-Fated Scots Colony at
Darien
Foyer, Archibald, supposed author. A defence of the Scots settlement at Darien. With an answer to the Spanish memorial against it. And arguments to prove that it is the interest of England to join with the Scots, and protect it. To which is added, a description of the country, and a particular account of the Scots colony. No place [Edinburgh?]: No publisher/printer, 1699. Small 4to (20 cm; 8"). [2] ff., 60 pp.
$1250.00
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As the 1690s wound down the lords and and burghers of Scotland dreamed of an overseas empire such as Spain, England, Portugal, and the Dutch had, and to this end came into existence the Company of Scotland for Trading to Africa and the Indies. Chartered in 1695 and with a coffer of some £400,000, it established a colony (“Darien”) on the Caribbean coast of what is now Panama, a worse location being hard to conceive. Even today that site is virtually uninhabited.
Trouble plagued the enterprise from the arrival of the first Scots in 1698 and it fairly shortly collapsed for lack of supplies, malaria, other diseases, internal dissension, a nonexistent trading base, and the might of the Spanish military in the region. The wreck of the scheme led to an economic crisis at home which in turn helped enable the 1707 Act of Unification.
The vast bulk of this work attempts to convince the English to support the Scots' enterprise and cites political, religious, social, and economic reasons for doing so; clearly, the Scots knew that English naval might in particular would be essential for the success of the scheme. Beyond this, however, a section (pp. 42 to 51) addresses the natural history, native population, agricultural commodities, and indigenous industry of the region; and the work ends with an account of the Scots' settlement, the buildings erected there, and its intercourse with the indigenous people.
Authorship of this work is problematic: It is signed “Philo-Caledon” at the end of the dedication and three other names have have been proposed as possible authors in addition to Foyer's — George Ridpath, Andrew Fletcher, and John Hamilton (2nd Baron Belhaven). Added to the conundrum of authorship, the work was produced in four editions in the same year, each having different numbers of pages, each with a different signature scheme, none with a publisher, and this one without even a place of publication!
Wing (rev. ed.) F2047; Sabin 78211; Alden & Landis 699/9; ESTC R18505 ; and Halkett & Laing II:32. 20th-century half dark brown crushed morocco with brown linen sides. This copy has all the hallmarks of having once been through a British bookseller's “hospital”: all leaves are dust-soiled or age-toned; all leaves are uncut but some have been extended and others not, and some leaves with torn margins (but not all) have had lost paper restored; all such repairs and extensions are within the first six leaves, meaning these were probably supplied from another copy. Top of title-leaf trimmed with loss of “A” of the title; another leaf with a tear to the top margin with loss costing tops of several letters of words on one page, and two leaves with the running head guillotined by a binder; some stray stains.
An interesting copy for its probable if problematic history and condition. (34130)

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