4to (217 x 154 mm), pp [xx, including portrait] 64; [6i] 65-203 [1, blank]; [8] 205-353 [3, blank]; [6] 357-538 [2, blank]; [4] 541-583 [1, blank]; [6] 585-729 [25] [4, blank, last blank cut away], with engraved portrait and one large woodcut diagram; some contemporary annotation to text, a very good, crisp copy in near-contemporary panelled calf, spine rubbed, joints slightly cracked but sound. £1850
Second edition, substantially rewritten (first 1643), an important work in documenting the spread of atomist philosophy in post-Galilean physics. The work is based on Bérigard's course on philosophy and physics at Padua. 'Since the preface to the chapter "De generatione et corruptione" named Galileo, Torricelli, Viviani, Cabeo, Bourdin, Boulliau, Mersenne, Descartes, Digby, Kircher, Kaspar Bartholin and his sons, and Borel as some of the contemporaries he admired, he was surely abreast of the intellectual movement of his time and was well disposed toward change. Yet the Scholasticism that he had to teach at times dominated his thought. For instance, although recognizing that sunspots prove that the sun is not incorruptible, he did not dare go so far as to say the same of the"heavens"'.
'The above list [which is quoted from the 1661 edition] also includes Gassendi, although he is usually cited as following Bérigard in reviving atomism...
'Actually, Bérigard found his inspiration less in Democritus, who was quite modern, than in the Ionians, who were still influenced by mythology: Anaximander, Empedocles, and Anaxagoras. In order to explain variations in being, these philosophers divided it into simple elements likely to combine. Because of this, the form the elements must be that most suitable to movement: round and smooth. These elements achieved cohesion by all moving in the same direction or toward one center' (DSB, with a detailed discussion of Bérigard's atomism, based on this edition, and how it differed from Gassendi's).
Part III contains a detailed discussion of the Copernican system and of Galileo's discoveries. Elsewhere in the book, Galileo is cited extensively.
Bérigard (1578-1664) was secretary to Christina of Lorraine, mother of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. He taught philosophy, botany, and mathematics at Pisa from 1628 to 1640. In 1640 he went to Padua (as second professor of philosophy), where he succeeded Liceti in 1653.
Provenance: signature of Thomas Pagel, dated 1667, on front free endleaf; the Earls of Macclesfield, Shirburn Castle, with engraved bookplate, shelfmark on front pastedown, and blindstamp Macclesfield crest on blank margins of first three leaves
Carli and Favaro 277; OCLC list two copies, Oxford and California State (and only one for the first edition, Oxford)
GBP 1850.00
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