pdf - Roger Gaskell Rare Books

Amsterdam: apud Joannem Janssonium à Waesberge, & Elizeum
Weyerstraet, 1666.
4to: A–3A4 (–3A4 blank), 187 of 188 leaves, pp. 392 (i.e. 294, 183, 184
repeated and last page mis­numbered); [2] 76 [2] (last page blank).
Sectional titlepage on 2O4, errata on 3A4r, typographic circular and
oval charts in the text and 12 full page engravings printed in the text,
the Wrst, on A1r, repeated on 2O4v.
195 x 145mm. Light soiling, gathering Y browned, dark stains in lower
blank margins towards the end.
Binding: Contemporary English blind ruled calf, marbled page edges.
Rebacked with the original unlettered spine laid down, corners worn.
Provenance: Contemporary signature J. Robertson on title and a MS
index in a more formal hand on a free endleaf.
First edition. The book was reissued at Leiden in 1696 as Chymiae
aurifodina incomparabilis. Ferguson II, pp. 246–7; Caillet 11061 and
2362; Wellcome, IV p. 486; Krivatsy 9439.
The Wrst part is a compilation of alchemical writings with 9 Wne alchemical
plates including 7 of the planets (the other plates are diagramatic). The
authorship is unknown. The second part, ‘Commentatio de Pharmaco
Catholico’ is usually attributed to Monte­Snyder and is a translation of his
‘Von der universal Medicin’, not printed in the original German until 1678
as Tractatus de Medicina Universali, Das is Von der Universel Medicin. Ferguson
points out that the titlepage to this second part states that it was translated
from German when the author happened to be in London. This may be what
led Caillet to attribute the work to the English alchemist Thomas Vaughn
(1621–1666).
Newton made a transcript of another work by Monte­Snyder, The
Metamorphosis of the Planets and followed his instructions in the laboratory.
That work refers to the present book, a copy of which Newton owned. He
studied the second part closely, entering many page and line references in the
margins of his copy and turning down many corners (Harrison, The Library
of Isaac Newton 1378; Dobbs, The Foundations of Newton’s Alchemy, p. 168n).
The present copy oVers a further intriguing connection with English alchemy
as it is in a contemporary English binding with an English provenance, having
belonged to one J. Robertson whom I have not so far been able to trace.
138
MÜLLER, Johannes Peter (1801–1858)
Zur vergleichenden Physiologie des Gesichtsinnes des
Menschen und der Thiere nebst einem Versuch über den
menschlichen Blick.
Leipzig: bei C. Cnobloch (Gedruckt bei S. F. Thormann in Bonn), 1826.
8vo, pp. xxxii 462 [2].
1 large folding table (at p. 140) and 8 folding engraved plates, 3 with
some hand­colouring, engraved by W. Engels, I. Schubert, and J. F.
Schröter, numbered Tab I–VIII (bound at the end).