Susanne Schulz-Falster Catalogue Eighteen - International League ...

De nostri temporis studiorum – ‘On Method in contemporary fields of
study’ contains the first statement of Vico’s original philosophical position.
It is generally pedagogical in emphasis and allows a reexamination of his
views on the unity of the sciences and human wisdom.
De antiquissima Italorum sapientia presents Vico’s system of metaphysics,
and contains the fullest statement of his ‘verum-factum’ principles. ‘Philosophically,
it offers a criticism of Descartes’s phenomenalism comparable,
in many ways, to that found in the works of C. S. Peirce and John
Dewey. Unlike other treatises of the early Enlightenment it transforms
the paradigm of the knower and contemplator of unchanging ideas and
processor of mental sensations into that of the knower as maker of truth.
In the history of thought. ‘De Antiquissima’ is significant because it marks
the transition in Vico’s intellectual development from the professor of
rhetoric to the philosopher of historical knowledge.’ (preface by Lucia
susanne schulz-falster rare books catalogue eighteen
M Palmer, to the Cornell edition of On the Most Ancient Wisdom of the
Italians, 1988).
This publication received two long reviews, which Vico responded to
with two equally long and considered replies, which are both present here.
Croce I, pp. 12; 15–16; 18–19; Parenti p. 510; Ziegenfuss II, 785.
Vico on Jurisprudence
116. VICO, Giambattista. Liber alter qui est de Constantia
Jurisprudentis ad amplissimum virum Franciscum Venturam a Regis
Consiliis. et Criminum quaestorem alterum. Naples, Felix Mosca,
1721. £3,200
4to, pp. [ix], 260; title vignette, small ownership stamp to title;
signature S-X, AA-BB, and DD quite browned, due to paper stock,
else with some spotting and faint marginal dampstaining to title and
first signatures; contemporary full vellum, lettering directly to spine;
extremities a little worn, but still a good copy.
First edition of Vico’s important contribution to the study of jurisprudence
and Roman law, in which he asserts his conception of the development of
law as governed by a single, universal principle of reason and authority.
It is important to note that Vico saw himself primarily as a lawyer, and
this work, together with the slightly earlier De Universi Juris contains much
of the preliminary material for the Scienza Nuova, the first version of which
contained a much more thorough rebuttal of the natural law theorists such
as Grotius, Selden and Pufendorf. Whereas he concentrated on juridical
questions in De Universi Juris, the Liber Alter has a wider aim, covering in
turn De Constantia Philosophiae and De Contantia Philologiae, and clearly
providing the outline for the Scienza Nuova.
Croce I, pp. 27–29, Ziegenfuss II, 785.
117. [VOLTAIRE.] MARCHAND, Jean-Henri. Testamento
politico del signore Francesco Maria Arouet di Voltaire, Traduzione
dal Francese. [n.p.], 1779. £450
8vo, engraved frontispiece, pp. vii, [1] blank, 130; uncut in
contemporary paste-paper stiff wrappers; a fine crisp copy.
First Italian edition of Marchand’s entertaining fictitious and scurrilous last
will of Voltaire, first published in French in 1770. Marchand, (died 1785),
lawyer and writer, was royal censor and a prolific author, mostly of satirical
and vaudeville publications.
Uncommon, OCLC records copies at Princeton, Florida Atlantic University, and
Texas A & M only; see Bengesco 2415 and Cioranescu 42428 for first French
edition; DBU III, p. 914.