An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding: In Four Books.

Locke, John

Published by Printed for Awnsham and John Churchil, at the Black-Swan in Pater-Noster Row, and Samuel Manship, at the Ship in Cornhill, near the Royal-Exchange, London, 1694

About this Item

Rare second edition of this fundamental work in the history of Western thought, the first to name Locke as the author and to include the frontispiece portrait of him. Folio, bound in three quarter calf over marbled boards with gilt ruling to the spine in six compartments within raised bands, rebacked retaining original morocco spine label lettered in gilt, engraved frontispiece portrait of Locke by P. Vanderbanck after Sylvester Brounower. In very good condition. The second edition of Locke's essay contains a number of important changes and additions to the text. It was the first to name Locke as the author and include the frontispiece portrait of him (indicative of the celebrity Locke acquired with the publication of the first edition in 1690). "When Thomas Basset was running out of copies of the first edition in February 1693, he signed a contract with Locke to pay him ten shillings per sheet for additional materials for a new printing. These additions included an expansion of Book I, Chap. IV; the chapter on power was almost entirely new; a new chapter, 'Of Identity and Diversity', was inserted as 2.27, making chapters 27-31 to be renumbered as 2.28-32; and a discussion was added to 2.9.8. Other numerous additions were made throughout, sectional summaries added in the margins, and an analytical index supplied" (Yolton). "It is Locke's second edition of the 'Essay on Human Understanding' that is the masterpiece we remember; the first, 1690, edition did not bear Locke's name, nor did it include a number of emendations that finished the work as Locke wanted it" (Matthews, Collecting Rare Books, 97). "Locke was the first to take up the challenge of Bacon and to attempt to estimate critically the certainty and the adequacy of human knowledge when confronted with God and the universe" (PMM 164). It is in this work that Locke (1632-1704) lays the foundations of British empiricism and the concept of the mind as a tabula rasa. "Locke summed up the Enlightenment in his belief in the middle class and its right to freedom of conscience and right to property, in his faith in science, and in his confidence in the goodness of humanity. His influence upon philosophy and political theory has been incalculable" (Columbia Encyclopedia).

Seller Inventory # 149652

Bibliographic Details

• Title: An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding: In Four Books.
• Publisher: Printed for Awnsham and John Churchil, at the Black-Swan in Pater-Noster Row, and Samuel Manship, at the Ship in Cornhill, near the Royal-Exchange, London
• Publication Date: 1694
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
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