AN ACCOUNT OF THE RISE, PROGRESS, AND PRESENT STATE OF THE MAGDALEN HOSPITAL, for the reception of penitent prostitutes. Together with Dr. Dodd's sermons. To which are added, the Advice to the Magdalens; with the psalms, hymns, prayers, rules, and list of subscribers. The fifth edition.

12mo, engraved frontispiece (a little browned and chipped at edges), and pp. [ii], vi, [iv], 360, [4]; a sound copy, rebound in new quarter calf over marbled boards. Fifth edition: first published in 1759, and here updated with the legacies received since that date. Dodd is so well-known for the way his life was ended, executed for forging a bond, and for the assistance that Samuel Johnson lent him in his last days, that it is often forgotten that he was selflessly involved in many charities, the most important of which was the Magdalen Hospital. This collection includes several of his sermons preached at the chapel there (pp. 45-228), designed obviously to improve the reformed prostitutes but just as much to raise money for the institution, because influential people came to hear him. At the end is a list of the governors of the charity, and of the contributors. The legacies received are also listed, some of them quite substantial: in 1772 Mrs Ann Hunt left them £500, and in 1774 Thomas Pike £1000.…