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Bala, Printed and published by Griffith Jones, 1848; 6mo, 115 x 185mm; pp xvi, [17]-292; full tree calf, marbled edges, panelled spine with gilt ornaments and a black leather title gilt reading "Sefyllfa Ddyfodol" (Future State); some rubbing of the corners and spine, inner joints partly cracked but the binding very firm; back end papers with some childish scribbles, text pages somewhat browned throughout; ink ownership signature on the front fly, 'Thomas Jones Dec 1849'; a good copy of this interesting and important work. . . . . . The work opens with an address to Thomas Chalmers, dated December 28 1827, followed by a 5pp introduction by Richard Parry. Following the General Conclusions, there's an appendix consisting largely of a letter by John Shepherd of Frome to Lord Byron in Pisa, referring to a prayer which Shepherd's late wife had composed and, he believed, intended to send to Byron. In his reply, dated from Pisa, December 8 1821, Byron remarked that he had "read it with all the delight that could be had from such an intense subject" adding that he didn't know if he had read anything "more outstandingly beautiful" before adding some remarks on the benefits of religion. . . . . . Dick, born in Dundee in 1774, studied philosophy and theology at Edinburgh University and duly became a teacher and Church of Scotland minister, but was excommunicated for having an affair with a servant. As a child he had developed an intense interest in astronomy and, more generally, in science and in practice became a bridge between the philosophers of the 18th century and the Victorian morality of the 19th. His "The Philosophy of a Future State" developed his views more fully and coherently, described as making Christian theology compatible with the empirical science of Francis Bacon; the work particularly influenced David Livingston who described it as second to the bible in that matter. He was a strong abolitionist and detested the practice of slavery. . . . . . This is a copy of the Welsh edition of Dick's "The Philosophy of a Future State", first published in English in Glasgow and then in the US in 1829. There appear to be two printings of the Welsh edition with the same year date but I've so far been unable to establish which preceded the other or if perhaps they appeared simultaneously. The second version of the book, a copy of which is in the US Library of Congress, shows it to have been printed and published in Gwrecsam (Wrexham) by R Hughes and Son. The two versions have clearly been set differently, the Hughes version being 8vo (but of almost the same size as this one) and runs to 287pp. The British Library appears only to have copies of the 1865 Welsh edition while the National Library of Wales lists four copies of each version, and advises for most of them that the work was initially issued in four parts, 1847-1848. Both versions of the 1848 Welsh edition appear scarce in contrast to the 1866 one.
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