The first and only incunable edition of this theological work, printed by the first printer of Augsburg, Günther Zainer (?-1478). He started his printing career in Augsburg in 1468 and is known to have been one of the printers at the new printing shop in the Augsburg Saint Ulrich and Saint Afra's Abbey. He probably learned the trade from Johannes Mentelin (ca. 1410-1478) in Strasbourg. Zainer's paper, presswork and typefaces are all of high quality and about 80 books are known to have been printed by him.
The De essentia divinitatis, the first tract in this collection, was thought to have been written by Saint Jerome, but it is actually the first chapter of Formulae spiritualis intelligentiae by Saint Eucherius of Lyon (ca. 380-ca. 449). In the present edition, this tract is printed together with Aquinas' De articulis fidei; the second tract starts on the leaf on which the first one ends. These works are part of a larger collection of separately published tracts, which includes Imitatio Christi by Thomas à Kempis, Soliloquia by Saint Augustine and Dispositorium moriendi by Johannes Nider. Nearly each tract was sold independently, so every collection differs in composition and number (varying from 1 to 11) of tracts.
With the bookplate of Bernd Pattloch mounted on the front pastedown and a manicule in the margin of page [14] of Aquinas's tract and some manuscript annotations in the margins of several leaves. The spine is slightly rubbed, and the blue edges are mostly faded. The gutters of the first and last leaves (excluding the modern endpapers) show remnants of earlier blue paper wrappers. With a water stain in the lower corner throughout, and a water stain in the outer margin in the second half of the work, both without affecting the text. With a repair in the blank foot margin on the final leaf of the text and in the outer margin of the last blank leaf. Overall in good condition. Goff H-179; GW 12451 II; Hain-Copinger 8589; IDL 2290; ISTC ih00179000; Oates 884; Proctor 1564 (mentions only 6 leaves); cf. Hampden, The life of Thomas Aquinas: A dissertation of the scholastic philosophy of the middle ages, 1848; Saint Eucherius, Formulas for spiritual intelligence (translated by D. P. Curtin).