A VIEW OF THE ELEMENTARY PRINCIPLES OF EDUCATION, FOUNDED ON THE STUDY OF THE NATURE OF MAN

188 x 120 mm. (7 3/8 x 4 3/4"). xii, 318 pp. Original tan cloth, smooth spine with printed paper label. Front pastedown with bookplate of John A. Seaverns; front free endpaper with ownership signature of John Stevens dated 31 January 1833. Cloth somewhat faded, slight fraying at tail of upper joint, label a bit scuffed, contents with occasional small stains, one marginal tear, and browning to a handful of leaves, but an extremely well-preserved copy of a fragile book, very clean and the condition issues all quite minor. In its original publisher's binding and from a major collection, this is an excellent copy of the first American printing of an influential work on education. Spurzheim (1776-1832) was better known as an exponent of phrenology and an authority on mental illness than as an educational theorist, but his "View of the Elementary Principles of Education" is nevertheless an important work that, for the most part, is sensible and progressive. Especially significant are his assertion that all influences from birth onward contribute to the physical and mental development of the child, and the inference he draws from this that, in addition to the conventional education of the intellect, an optimal upbringing must include attention to such things as clean air, proper diet, and suitable exercise. He favors public education over private instruction because children will benefit by meeting a variety of people with "different manners of feeling and thinking." Spurzheim shows himself to be generally tolerant and forward thinking, as he maintains that good education can improve almost anybody (it would certainly reduce the number of criminals). But he sometimes disappoints, as in his belief that many limitations are hereditary and must be taken into account in designing the most fitting education for an individual. He states, for example, that the poor ought to be prevented from reproducing, as if poverty were in the genes. And, in answering the claims of Mary Wollstonecraft's "Vindication of the Rights of Women," he says, "I cannot perceive any arrangement of nature that can lead me to expect that women will cease to be considered as subordinate to men. Let them endeavor, if they please, to acquire the same degree of talent, but till they have acquired it, let them cherish order and exercise the virtues of their actual condition in society, rather than attempt to rise into a sphere for which they are not at present fitted." Also appended here is a section on the treatment and reform of criminals, in which the author calls for a better understanding of the causes of crime, for the requiring of prisoners to undertake useful work and courses of instruction while in prison, and for the study of the prison system instituted by William Penn at Philadelphia. This copy is from the library of John A. Seavers, a self-described "omnivorous collector" whose interests ran particularly toward equestrian books as well as books and ephemera across genres. Much of his collection now resides at Tufts University.…