HUET, Pierre Daniel. Commentarius de rebus ad eum pertinentibus.

HUET, Pierre Daniel. Commentarius de rebus ad eum pertinentibus.HUET, Pierre Daniel. Commentarius de rebus ad eum pertinentibus. Amsterdam: Henry du Sauzet. 1718. Small 8vo. Modern full calf, spine with raised bands, lettered and ruled in gilt; pp. [xvi, the initial two blank], 427, [112], [2, blank], title page in red and black and with woodcut vignette; this page with two small paperflaws, initial blank with re enforced margins; a good copy of an uncommon autobiography; contemporary presentation inscriptions to

HUET, Pierre Daniel. Commentarius de rebus ad eum pertinentibus. Amsterdam: Henry du Sauzet. 1718.

Small 8vo. Modern full calf, spine with raised bands, lettered and ruled in gilt; pp. [xvi, the initial two blank], 427, [112], [2, blank], title page in red and black and with woodcut vignette; this page with two small paperflaws, initial blank with re-enforced margins; a good copy of an uncommon autobiography; contemporary presentation inscriptions to initial blank (see below).

First edition of this intellectual autobiography by the French philosopher and scientist Pierre-Daniel Huet (1630-1721).

Initially a proponent of Cartesianism, Huet later turned against Descartes as a proponent of fideism, a position which ranks faith equal with reason. He was bishop of Soissons and later Avranches. His intellectual output ranged from etymology to chemistry, logic and the history of the trade in antiquity. He set up the second scientific institution in France with a Royal charter, the Académie de Physique in his hometown of Caen.

Provenance: Presented in 1722 to the Archdeacon of Barnstaple by Thomas Lynford (d. 1724), Church of England clergyman, chaplain to William III, Queen Anne, and George I.

SKU: 2121281