[Rarebooks] fa: ESSAIS SUR DIVERS SUJETS INTERESSANS 1760 • Scarce Georg Ludwig Schmid Essay on Agriculture, &c.

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auction ending Sunday, September 21. More details and images can be found at the URL below or by searching under the seller name arch_in_la.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/arch_in_la/m.html?item=351168108877&

Thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
L.A.

[Georg Ludwig Schmid d'Auenstein:] Essais sur Divers Sujets Intéressans de Politique et de Morale. [s.l., s.n.]: 1760. FIRST EDITION. Small 8vo (18.5 cm), untrimmed in early/period marbled wraps; xi, [1], 362, [2] pp. Goldsmiths-Kress 09548. Lacking paper on the spine, but the gatherings are securely held; light damp-stain and toning to the last 3 leaves, modest wear and dust-soiling to the untrimmed edges, otherwise very clean and sound. Early owner has written "Tom 1" on the title-page, but listings in OCLC, European Library, and other catalogues indicate there was no second volume, that the work is complete in a single volume of 362 pp.

A surprisingly scarce collection of essays, sometimes erroneously attributed to Albrecht von Haller, but in fact written by the Swiss diplomat, economist and political scientist Georg Ludwig Schmid (1720-1805). Of particular importance is his essay on agriculture, published simultaneously here and in the transactions of the Economic Society of Bern, in which he "unmasked the patriotic mystique that surrounded French agronomie,"claiming that "the new French fashion for agricultural improvement was not a road to virtue, but to the restoration of France to great power status" (Wennerlind and Schaba, eds., David Hume's Political Economy, 2008). The five essays are: I.Sur les Philosophes et la Philosophie. II. Sur l'Amour & la Jalousie. III. Sur les Projêts. IV. Sur l'Agriculture. V. Sur le Luxe & la Commerce.