De Civitate Dei. by AUGUSTINE, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

271 (of 274 leaves, without the blank leaves 1, 16, & 274). 50 lines. Roman types. First text page illuminated with elaborate three-sided border in blue, green, red & gold, incorporating two large capitals "I" & "C", Christ's symbol, a hare, and a coat-of-arms (see below). 21 eight-line illuminated initials with floral decoration & extensions in color & pen-work, 2-line initials alternating in red & blue. Chapter numbers supplied in red for the first 6 leaves of the table, chapter headings supplied in red throughout, chapter numbers in upper margin in red. Royal folio (370 x 242 mm.), 18th-cent. English red morocco (well-rebacked), sides panelled in gilt with border of alternating thistle, coronet, flower & crown, spine gilt, green morocco lettering piece on spine, a.e.g. Venice: Johannes & Vindelinus de Spira, 1470. Third or fourth edition (see below) of the most important work of St. Augustine; this is a magnificent copy printed throughout on vellum and finely illuminated for Leonardo Loredano (1436-1521), doge of Venice from 1501 until his death, with his family's coat-of-arms at the foot of the first text page. This is one of nine recorded copies printed on vellum of the fourth book printed in Venice. It was begun by the city's first printer Johannes de Spira, who had possibly learned the art in Mainz and was completed by his brother Vindelinus. The colophon gives a brief and fascinating history of the press and of this edition, stating that Johannes had already produced two editions of Cicero and one hundred copies of Pliny within three months and that he had died during the printing of De Civitate Dei. His death caused Vindelinus to take over the printing of the book. Based on the number of other works printed by Vindelinus in 1470 it has been argued by Ferdinand Geldner in his Die deutschen Inkunabeldrucker, pp. 62-64 that this Venetian edition appeared early in 1470 and thus pre-dates the Sweynheym and Pannartz Roman edition of the same year, making it the third, not the fourth, edition of De Civitate Dei.Saint Augustine (354-430), one of the four great Fathers of the Latin Church, designed this text as a great apologetic treatise in vindication of Christianity and the Christian Church. The City of God was written between 413 and 426 and represents the first Christian philosophy of history. "The impulse to the writing of the 22 books of the 'City of God', which was spread over several years, arose out of the fall of Rome to Alaric in 410. The event had caused consternation throughout the civilized world, and Augustine, who himself was profoundly moved, conceived the book as a reply to pagans who maintained that the fall of the city was due to the abolition of the heathen worship. It led him to deal with the fundamental contrast between Christianity and the world, and has made it the supreme exposition of a Christian philosophy of history."-Cross, F.L., The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, p. 107. "The first five books deal with the polytheism of Rome, the second five with Greek philosophy, particularly Platonism and Neo-Platonism (which are seen as leading inevitably to Christianity in which their problems are finally resolved), and the last twelve books with the history of time and eternity as set out in the Bible. History is conceived as the struggle between two communities -- the Civitas coelestis of those inspired by the love of God, leading to contempt of self, and the Civitas terrena or diaboli of those living according to man, which may lead to contempt of God. This struggle of the two conceptions of life had dominated Augustine's personal life and is here transferred to the wider field of world history. Both these powers fighting for the allegiance of the human soul are inextricably intermingled in society's earthly institutions; but history is understood as a continuous evolution of the divine purpose and all forces work towards redemption of man by God's grace, the central feature of St Augustine's theology. It is for this reason that he is considered as the founder of a new science, to which Voltaire assigned the name 'philosophy of history'. For the first time a comprehensive survey of human history is presented... "In economics Augustine praised labour as a means towards moral perfection; interest charges on money were not allowed under his system, but trade could be carried on, if selling was done honestly and a 'just price' was charged and paid. Many of the medieval regulations about commerce and prices were derived from these ideas, and his contrasting description of a just ruler (imbued with piety, humility, fairness) and the tyrant or Antichrist (impiety, craving for glory) powerfully influenced Renaissance thought... "'The City of God' pervaded the whole Middle Ages...The book remained authoritative until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries...The idea of international law was partly derived from the book."-Printing & the Mind of Man 3-(1st edition: Subiaco, 1467). Provenance: Loredano family (Leonardo, doge of Venice 1501-21), with the family's coat-of-arms on first text page; Dukes of Devonshire, with the Chatsworth bookplate (sold Christie's London, 6 June 1974, lot 1); J.R. Ritman, with bookplate (Margaret Lane Ford, Christ, Plato, Hermes Trismegistus. The Dawn of Printing. Catalogue of the Incunabula in the Bibliotheca Philosophia Hermetica, no. 25). A fine and handsome luxury copy, richly illuminated and printed throughout on vellum. Preserved in a box. ❧ Goff A-1233. .