PERRAULT (Charles). Parallèle des anciens et des modernes, e - Lot 59

PERRAULT (Charles). Parallèle des anciens et des modernes, en ce qui regarde les arts et les sciences. Dialogues. ÀParis, chez Jean Baptiste Coignard, 1688. In-12, (40 of which the 2nd blank)-252-32-(2blanches-8 [numbered 27to34]-(2, the first errata, the second blank)pp. in granite-brown calf, spine ribbed, cloisonné and fleuronné, decorated edges, speckled edges; binding a little rubbed with a split jaw, stain to front (contemporary binding). Rare first edition; copy complete with errata leaf. Includes 2 prose dialogues, followed by 3 poems: "Le siècle de Louis le Grand", "Epistre au roy, a l'occasion du poeme precedent, et sur l'excez de joye que Paris temoigna de la convalescence de SaMajesté", and "Le genie. Epistre a monsieur de Fontenelle". A key work in the querelle des Anciens et des Modernes, in which Charles Perrault undertakes the ambitious project of reassessing "modern" knowledge, showing the relationships between the various disciplines and between them and a political field that underwent profound transformation in the course of the seventeenth century.