Hebrew Printing in Sabbioneta 1 AFFO, Ireneo - Schulz-Falster Rare ...

the English system.’ (Carpanetto & Ricuperati, Italy in the Age of Reason
1685–1789, pp. 125–127).
MaVei discussed the complex system of balance of power in the Venetian
government, which excluded the local ruling classes from involvement in
state policy. He proposed a daring solution, and used the Roman Republic
as the most obvious example. There, according to MaVei, had been a transfer
of power from the people to the Senate with the progressive involvement
of the conquered populations, paciWed and absorbed with full rights
into the Roman system. Venice too, MaVei suggested, should extend the
privileges of the capital city to the whole country, including the representation
not only of urban patricians but also of the producing classes, merchants
and artisans. The civil transformation of Venetian society (and more
generally that of Italy) had to start with the political, moral and intellectual
reform of this patriciate’.
Illuminismo Italiano alla Fondazione Feltrinelli 326; see Silvestri Giuseppe, Un europeo
de Settecento Scipione Maffei, Treviso, 1954, pp. 169–170; L. Rossi, Un precursore
di Montesquieu: Scipione Maffei in Scritti vari di diritto pubblico, VI, Milano,
1941, 1941, pp. 75–240.
A Pioneer of Modern Political Journalism
74 MALLET DU PAN, Jacques [editor]. Mercurio Britannico
ossia Notizie storico-critiche sugli aVari attuali. Vol. I [–Vol. V].
London, G. and C. Spilesbury Snow-Hill, Venice, Francesco
Andreola, 1798–1800. £750
Thirty-six issues bound in Wve volumes, 8vo, pp. viii, 705 (pagination
jumps from 8 to 15, but complete (issues 1 –8); 578 (issues 9–16);
578, [8] (issues 17–24); 578, (issues 25–32); 298 (issues 33–36);
occasional light spotting and foxing, vol. IV tear to foremargin of K3
with loss, vol. V, Ii3 with paper fault, resulting in loss of one letter;
bound in contemporary full mottled sheep, spine in compartments,
ruled in gilt, gilt-lettered spine label; extremities a little rubbed, but in
all a Wne and attractive set.
First edition in Italian of Mallet du Pan’s Mercure Britannique, his political
journal, published in England after Mallet du Pan had been driven from
France and Switzerland. A true pan-European enterprise, the journal was
published more or less simultaneously in French, English and Italian, and
was a signiWcant political force. The work is an important source of political
and social commentary with a clearly anti-revolutionary stance, but
diVerent from other émigrés Mallet du Pan remained an important semiobjective
observer and critic of the French Revolution. The articles contained
in the journal are wide-ranging and cover political, social and economic
events from all over Europe, and included contributions by Malouet,
Gentz and other European Wgures.
One particularly interesting example of Mallet du Pan’s style of investigative
journalism is his denouncement of the looting that had gone on during
catalogue fourteen