DEVOUT MEDITATIONS: or, a collection of thoughts upon religious and philosophical subjects. The second edition.

HOWE, Charles.

Published by Edinburgh: printed by Hamilton Balfour and Neill, 1752

About this Item

Small 8vo in fours, pp. [ii], viii, [ii] blank, 187; a clean copy in contemporary red morocco, covers with gilt roll-tool featuring a crown, spine gilt (no label); marbled endpapers, gilt edges (worn, upper cover coming loose). Second edition: first published in 1751. Charles Howe (1661-1742) spent his youth at the court of Charles II, and then in an embassy abroad the preface does not say where before returning to marry and live in Northamptonshire. Five of his six children died as infants, and his wife also died in 1696; he spent the next 46 years 'in a close retirement, consecrated to religious meditations and exercises', published here by George Macaulay (1716-66) who had married his granddaughter, but who was also notable as a man-midwife. These meditations were first published in 1751, anonymously. In this second edition, there are some alterations to the text (explained in a new preface), and an admiring letter from Edward Young: 'The book of meditations I have read, and more than once; and I shall never lay it far out of my reach: for a greater demonstration of a sound head, and a sincere heart, I never saw'. This copy is in a fine Scottish binding, now (alas) rather worn. All the early editions are rare: of this one (which is also found with a variant title page), ESTC lists a total of seven copies: two in Edinburgh, two in London, two in Oxford and one at McMaster University. Provenance. Early inscription on endpaper of J. [or possibly S.] Chambers; then armorial bookplate of Julius Charles Hare (1795-1855), clergyman, teacher, traveller, broadchurchman, and proselyte for the poetry of Wordsworth and Coleridge and for German literature. In the 20th century it belonged to A.B. Rendall, with inscription dated 1917, and John C. Foster.

Seller Inventory # 26920

Bibliographic Details

• Title: DEVOUT MEDITATIONS: or, a collection of thoughts upon religious and philosophical subjects. The second edition.
• Publisher: Edinburgh: printed by Hamilton Balfour and Neill
• Publication Date: 1752
• Binding: Hardcover
• Seller catalogs:
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