Description
DIDEROT (Denis). LETTER ON THE BLIND, FOR THE USE OF THOSE WHO SEE. London, unnamed, 1749. In-12 of 220-[1]-1bl. pages, signed. A-N8, O6, 1 f. n. ch. (notice to the binder), marbled calf, triple fillet on the boards, gilt fleururettes on the corners, spine ribbed and decorated, spotted edges (period binding). Diderot defends in this famous letter the atheism of the blind-born Saunderson and claims to justify it in the name of logic, as if the idea of God was only an illusion of the sense of sight. This letter (printed clandestinely in Paris by Simon for Durand) earned its author three months' imprisonment in Vincennes. ORIGINAL FIRST EDITION, with the title finial "in the shape of a scale", the faulty signatures, the unnumbered and blank page 210 and the notice to the binder on the front of the last unnumbered leaf. The 6 engravings outside the text are correctly placed. First issue copy on thin paper according to Adams. Small rubs to the hinges, a good copy with large margins. (In French in the text, n°153).
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DIDEROT (Denis). LETTER ON THE BLIND, FOR THE USE OF THOSE WHO SEE. London, unnamed, 1749. In-12 of 220-[1]-1bl. pages, signed. A-N8, O6, 1 f. n. ch. (notice to the binder), marbled calf, triple fillet on the boards, gilt fleururettes on the corners, spine ribbed and decorated, spotted edges (period binding). Diderot defends in this famous letter the atheism of the blind-born Saunderson and claims to justify it in the name of logic, as if the idea of God was only an illusion of the sense of sight. This letter (printed clandestinely in Paris by Simon for Durand) earned its author three months' imprisonment in Vincennes. ORIGINAL FIRST EDITION, with the title finial "in the shape of a scale", the faulty signatures, the unnumbered and blank page 210 and the notice to the binder on the front of the last unnumbered leaf. The 6 engravings outside the text are correctly placed. First issue copy on thin paper according to Adams. Small rubs to the hinges, a good copy with large margins. (In French in the text, n°153).
