edited in Amsterdam
Father Noël-Antoine Pluche
Father Noël-Antoine Pluche (1688-1761) The spectacle of nature, Tomo II, Contenant ce qui regarde les dehors & l’intérieur de la Terre
It often happens that something arises from a precise idea, in particular a book, with a purpose already prefixed in the author’s mind, that is to write and then publish.
This is not the case, and yet this is one of the greatest editorial successes of the eighteenth century.
The author is, of course, since they were the only ones who could have an in-depth education, a priest, such father Noël-Antoine Pluche (1688-1761), said the Abbé Pluche, who taught rhetoric University of Reims in the early 1700s. I guess her was a quiet and also satisfying life: teaching also means thinking and thinking, answering students' questions, deepening a passion, in short having a routine. It's all right until in 1713, Pope Clement He condemned the hymns, and the convictions were not verbal calls, but they meant prison, torture and death. Abbé Pluche had a thought similar to the Jansenites; man was born evil and prone to evil, only a rigorous moral discipline and an unlimited faith can bring man to God, even if at the bottom man is already predestined. A faith very close to Calvinism that the Church could not tolerate.
So Abbé Pluche took his things and as many, before and after him, escaped from France to save the sieve and took refuge in Normandy, where, with the help of God, he had found the role of preceptor to the son of someone powerful. All his theological science and his lectures for Reims students were useless now, because Enlightenment was pushing towards a knowledge of sciences, in particular nature and the boy to whom he lectured was of ready intelligence, was fashionable and absolutely wanted to fit into mainstream culture. To stem the likely disaster of losing its role, Abbé Pluche began to prepare lessons on the nature to be presented to the student. Years of research and meticulous work started with despair, then became a series of sheets that accumulated in his room giving him some satisfaction. And as he kept a continuous card with the widow Etienne living in Paris, He always wrote her about these lessons. The widow Etienne was a widow but not stupid and therefore wrote to him that at the bottom of all that stuff you could well make a book. And the father, recognized in his labors, accepted well.
The work was printed in Paris, in pocket format, under royal privilege, that is, the king sold to the printers the possibility to print, and the typographer became the only holder of the rights of the book. If someone else wanted to print it, then it was necessary to pay a royalty to publishers. The author and his intellectual property It didn't matter to anyone. The booklet, begun to be printed in 1732, was very successful, so that the printers continued to reproduce it until 1750.
But what we see was printed in 1743 in Amsterdam, from a consortium of entrepreneurs who combined to divide the risk of business. In practice, it is a pirate work because no one intended to pay anything to the Paris printers. The thing that amazes me is that, unlike the present day, it is written proudly that the book is "pirated" work printed in Amsterdam, while today's counterfeiting do anything to hide it.
The booklet started in wooden boxes and went extensively throughout Europe: science yes but with economic return. Abbé Pluche was never recognized as money but a lot of fame and a lot of authority in this matter, and that was enough to him, because he was a scholar before even an austere priest, and for a scholar there is no greater satisfaction than seeing his work printed and reprinted. and diffused everywhere in the most important libraries in Europe.
It was the middle of the eighteenth century and we realize that the whole world is a country and making ideas circulate is fundamental even if to do so it is necessary to circumvent the monopolies that, as it is evident, by their nature are harmful to the many.
technical specifications
- Leather binding (probably veal), coeva or a little back
- All the tables present: 36
- Frontespizio in red and black well preserved, with engraved door
- Only second volume (all counts 8/9)
- measures: 10 cm x 17 cm
- Handwritten notes: on the forehead we read a note of ink possession: it seems "De Pietro..." or similar, and another signature below
in the YouTube channel you will find the full video in ASMR, where I unpack it all. For some reason I can't incorporate the video so if you want to find the link below.
at the bottom is August also for me and more I can not do.
The book is available, enough contact me from here
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