Featured Works
Our collection is composed of renowned works that are recognized around the world. Many of these works have had a profound effect on the world and how we think today.
Economics
Liberty & Dignity
Mathematics & Science
Philosophy
Politics
Religion
Two Treatises of Government by John Locke
Featured Work Second Edition. John Locke first published "Two Treatises of Government" anonymously in 1689 as a defense of the Glorious Revolution. The first treatise discusses patriarchalism - the idea that the power of the monarchy is absolute - through an attack on...
Fables by Aesop
Featured Work First Edition. Sir Roger L’Estrange’s version of the “Fables of Aesop” was printed in 1692. It is a collection of fables attributed to Aesop, who is believed to be a Greek slave and storyteller that lived between 620 and 564 BC. Originally passed down...
Scivias Libri Tres by Hildegard of Bingen
Featured Work First Edition, except were cited. This volume is entitled "Liber trium virorum & trium spiritualium virginum" and includes six texts in one volume with a woodcut title page of full length figures portraying the six authors with their renowned...
The Common-wealth of Oceana by James Harrington
Featured Work First Edition. James Harrington’s great Utopian political treatise, “The Common-Wealth of Oceana,” was published in 1656. “Oceana” was published in two first editions for Daniel Pakeman and Livewell Chapman (presented here) by John Streater with their...
The Trial of John Peter Zenger
Featured Work Published in Dublin in 1738 under the title, “The Trial of John Peter Zenger,” this volume was originally published in Boston, Massachusetts in 1738 as “A Brief Narrative of the Case and Tryal of John Peter Zenger.” It contains the pleadings and...
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
Featured Work First English Edition. “The Prince” by Niccolo Machiavelli first appeared in 1513 in a correspondence version under the title, “De Principatibus.” It was first published five years after Machiavelli’s death in 1532 in Italian by Antonio Blado d'Asola....
De Officis by Marcus Tullius Cicero
Featured Work Manuscript in Latin, on paper. This manuscript of Marcus Tullius Cicero’s “De Officis” was prepared for Nicolai Renciade by an unknown scribe in 1446. Renciade was a student of Giovanni de Juvianello, a professor of grammar, rhetoric, and poetics in...
The Republic of Plato
Featured Work First Edition in English. “The Republic of Plato in Ten Books” was translated by H. Spens and includes a preliminary discourse concerning the philosophy of the ancients by the translator. “Republic” is Plato’s best-known work, written in approximately...
King James Bible, “He” Version
Featured Work First Edition, “He” Version. The King James Bible, “He” Version published in 1611 by Robert Barker. The volume includes the Old and New Testaments as well as the genealogies of the Holy Scriptures. There were two editions of the King James Bible printed...
The Proceedings of the House with Respect to the Petitions for a Repeal of the Alien and Sedition Laws
Featured Work First Edition. This work contains the House Committee Report and the speeches of John Nicholas, a Virginia Congressman, and Albert Gallatin, a representative from Pennsylvania, about the Alien and Sedition Acts passed by the fifth Congress and signed...
Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant
Featured Work First German Edition. This is the highly influential work of Immanuel Kant’s “Critik der reinen Vernuft” (“Critique of Pure Reason”), published in 1781 by Johann Friedrich Hartknoch in Riga. Kant explores and examines the foundations and parameters of...
Areopagitica by John Milton
Featured Work First Edition. “Areopagitica; A Speech of Mr. John Milton For the Liberty of Unlicenc'd Printing, To the Parlament of England” was written by English poet John Milton and published in 1644. It was written in opposition to licensing and censorship. In the...