160 - HURTAUT, Pierre Thomas Nicolas. The Art of Farting: A Theoretical, Physical, and Methodological Essay. [Bound with] Ratomania, or the Moral and Critical Dream of a Young Philosopher.

HURTAUT, Pierre Thomas Nicolas. The Art of Farting: A Theoretical, Physical, and Methodological Essay. [Bound with] Ratomania, or the Moral and Critical Dream of a Young Philosopher. An excellent collection of two clandestine literary pranks. In Westphalia [Paris], Published by Florent-Q, 1775. In-12 (167 x 94 mm), brown half-leather, smooth cloth decorated with grotesque motifs and a red leather title label, dark beige paper covers, red-speckled edges. XI and 136 pp., engraved frontispiece. Binding restored; the paper of *L'Art de péter* is slightly browned. Second edition, expanded to include *The History of Pet-en-l'Air* and *The Queen of the Amazons*, of this classic of the Enlightenment’s playful, clandestine, and scatological literature. A complete copy featuring its free-standing etched frontispiece bearing the inscription “Qui potest capere capiat” (Let him who can understand, understand). This quotation from the Gospel according to Saint Matthew is subverted: the author ironically plays on the double meaning of the Latin verb *capere*, which means both “to understand” intellectually and “to hold or contain” physically (the wind). Bound together with, at the beginning of the volume: [SABATIER DE CASTRES, Antoine]. *La Ratomanie, or A Moral and Critical Dream of a Young Philosopher by Madame ****. Amsterdam [Paris], n.p., 1767. 196 pp. Published anonymously and attributed to Abbé Sabatier de Castres, this satirical novel uses the allegorical journey of a young woman to lambast the pride and vanity of modern systems. It directly targets Voltaire and Rousseau, whom it accuses of corrupting public morals. Wet bookplate stamps on the inside front cover and title page belonging to Barthélémy Courbon (1793–1854), a lawyer and bibliophile from Saint-Étienne. A fine copy.