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Very rare issue with the 7 corrected leaves of Lavoisier's first major separately published work

LAVOISIER, Antoine Laurent.
Opuscules physiques et chymiques.

With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792).

With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792).

With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792).

With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792).

With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792).



Paris, Laurent François Prault for Durand neveu (Pierre Etienne Germain), François Ambroise Didot le jeune, & Jacques Esprit, 1774. 2 parts in one. First volume (= all published). 8vo. Contemporary marbled calf, spine ribbed and gilt in compartments, red morocco title label lettered in gold, gilt binding edges, red painted edges, marbled endpapers. With several fine woodcut borders, head- and end-pieces, some tables in the text, and 23 figures on three folding plates by and after Pierre-Claude de la Gardette (1745-1792). (2), ii (corrected dedication), xxx, (2), 436 pp. (6 extra lvs between pp. 434 and 435).

Very rare variant-issue of the original edition of the first major, separately published work by the famous French chemist Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (1743-1794), the father of modern chemistry. The first part is entitled: 'Précis historique sur les émanations élastiques qui se dégagent des corps pendant la combustion, pendant la fermentation & pendant les effervescences'; the second part: 'Nouvelles recherches sur l'existence d'un  fluide élastique dans quelques substances, & sur les phénomènes qui résultent de son dégagement ou de sa fixation'.
It is a pioneer work in which Lavoisier first gives a historical survey of previous workers' efforts and then describes his own experiments on gases and the conclusions he derived. 'On 20 February 1773, Lavoisier opened a new research notebook with a memorandum announcing his intention to embark on a "long series of experiments" on the elastic fluid emitted from bodies during various chemical reactions and on the air absorbed during combustion. The subject was obviously so important - "destined", as he put it, "to bring about a revolution in physics and chemistry"- that he proposed in the succeeding months to repeat all early experiments and to extend his own. The results were presented to the Academy of sciences in the summer of 1773, and formed the substance of his first book, the Opuscules physiques et chimiques which was published in January 1774' (DSB VIII, pp. 74-5). It is also in this work that Lavoisier first gave expression to his doubts on the phlogiston theory, an obsolete scientific theory that posited the existence of, in addition to the classical four elements of the Greeks, an additional fire-like element called phlogiston that was contained within combustible bodies, and released during combustion.
The book was intended to be the first of a series of vols. containing the results of his investigations. The later vols., however, never materialized. A posthumous reissue was published in 1801; the Opuscules was translated with notes and an appendix by Thomas Henry as Essays physical and Chemical (1776); a German translation by C.E. Weigel appeared as vol. 1 of his 5-vol. collection entitled Physikalisch-chemische Schriften (1783-94).
Our copy of Lavoisier's important first scientific work contains the remarkable variant-issue with the 7 corrected leaves ('cancellanses') bound in. which are all marked with an *: after the title there is the corrected dedication leaf (pp. i-ii) to Mr. Trudaine de Montigny with a woodcut head piece, before the original dedication (pp. i-ii (=fol. a1). The text is very slightly altered. Furthermore, at the end between pp. 434 and 435 there are six extra corrected leaves bound in: pp. 255-6, 5-6, 283-4, 193-4, 307-8 and 257-8. In our copy the original leaves are still present in their appropriate places, so that we can see the alterations of the text. These are also of very minor importance, but show how very painstakingly indeed Lavoisier's work was revised in proof.
Apparently a number of copies of this variant were issued; the British Museum copy for instance is made up exactly as our copy.

Fine copy.
Duveen & Klickstein 121; W. A. Cole, Chemical Literature 1700-1860 769; Duveen, Bibl. alchemica et chemica, p. 339 ; Dict. of Scientific Biogr. VIII, pp. 74-5, 87; Partington, III, pp. 388-94; Poirier 74-6.

Related Subjects: 18th Century  Chemistry  French  Physics 

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