The lives of the French, Italian, and German Philosophers. Late members of the Royal Academy of Science in Paris. Together with abstracts Of some of the Choicest Pieces, communicated by them to that Illustrious Society. To which is added, The preface of the Ingenious Monsieur Fontenelle, Secretary and Author of the History of the said Academy

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[16], xxxv, [1], 123, 122-441, 552, 455- 464pp, [4]. With two terminal advertisement leaves. Contemporary gilt-tooled, blind-panelled polished calf, contrasting red morocco lettering-piece, small shelf-label to head of spine. A trifle rubbed, slightly chipped at head, else a fine copy. The Macclesfield copy, with the armorial 'North Library' bookplate (shelf-mark 45.C.29) and typical armorial blind- stamps to title page and first two leaves of text, pencilled shelf-marks to front endpapers. A choice copy of John Chamberlayne's significant translation of short biographies or 'Elogy, as Mons. Fontenelle calls it' of eminent European scientists and mathematicians, members of the French Academy of Sciences, with excellent provenance: from the library of the dedicatee, Thomas Parker, 1st Earl of Macclesfield (1666-1732). Whilst the biographies within are translations of the work of Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle (1657-1757), celebrated French author and secretary, for forty-two years, of the Academy of Sciences, in the second half of the work English writer John Chamberlayne (c.1668-1772) has added brief English abstracts of 'some of the Choicest Pieces, Memoirs, Dissertations, &c' taken from the Academy's Transactions, including work on flora, fauna, entomology ('Upon Bees'), geological and meteorological phenomena. Chamberlayne's gushing dedication of this work to Lord Parker - then Lord Chief Justice - references the latter's patronage of the sciences, was apparently presented 'without.consent or knowledge', and indeed is referenced in his later works also dedicated, with similar gusto, to the Earl of Macclesfield. This, taken with the presence in the Macclesfield library of several copies of works presented to Chamberlayne (including Miscellanea Berolinensia ad incrementum scientiarum, Berlin, 1710, inscribed by Dr. Daniel Ernst Jablonski), likely acquired by Parker after the 1724 sale of the library of Chamberlayne pere et fils further suggests a close connection between the two. A printed postscript to the dedication of this work, also directed by Chamberlayne at 'My Lord' Parker, discusses the disagreement over 'the Differential Calculation, as the Invention thereof, which I think is every where ascribed to the late Mons. Liebnitz', and 'no where attributed, as it ought, to our own Countryman Sir Isaac Newton, the First Mathematician in the World', and shares with his readership that 'Dr. Keill.has done our British Philosopher justice; and fully proved that which Mr. L did in some manner acknowledge to me (when I attempted to reconcile these two Great Men) that Sir I.N. might be the first inventor'. Although not a presentation copy per se, given the connection between the translator and early owner this is surely one of the most interesting copies available of this significant work documenting the work of the French academicians. Size: 8vo. N° de ref. del artículo AQ19580

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