Principes du droit politique
First edition.
A superb wide-margined copy preserved in its contemporary morocco with the arms of King Louis XV.
2parts in 2 volumes 8vo of (3) ll., 303 pp. et (1) l., 220 pp. (2) fll.
Contemporary red morocco, triple gilt filet on covers, gilt arms at center, gilt edges.
163 x 103 mm.
Burlamaqui, Jean-Jacques. Principes du droit politique.
Amsterdam, Zacharie Chatelain, 1751.
First edition of this fundamental work by Burlamaqui
One of the founding works of the philosophy of the Enlightenment.
« Burlamaqui was able to express in the language of his time, in clear and pure French, what a Grotius or a Puffendorf could have explained only in enormous books, full of examples and quotations drawn from antiquity and the Holy Scriptures.” (Gagnebin, Burlamaqui and the Natural Law, 1944, p. 300).
The theses of Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui (1694-1748), «the other Genevan Jean-Jacques», have had a significant influence, attested by some sixty editions and their translation into seven languages.
“Among the Protestant theorists of political law, Burlamaqui was the most direct and obvious influence on Rousseau,” writes Gaspard Vallette. Rousseau’s fellow, Burlamaqui had professed at the Geneva Academy «the Protestant theory of natural law and political law». In the preface to his “Discourse on inequality”, Rousseau explicitly refers to the doctrines of Burlamaqui. It is obvious that he has known them. His works were for Rousseau a means of information; the author of the «Social Contract» found there as a clear and well-ordered synthesis of theories developed by schools, touching on natural and political law”
(Del Vecchio).
« Montesquieu’s ideas are in line with those that Burlamaqui (1694-1748) had been defending since the 1730s. The Master of Geneva was a precursor of Montesquieu’s ideas » (Jean-Paul Valette).
“Burlamaqui reveals more explicitly than any other writer read by Jefferson the logical substructure upon which Jefferson built when he wrote in the Rough Draft [of the Declaration of Independence]: "We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable; that all men are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty & the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men"”
(White, Philosophy of the American Revolution).
A superb wide-margined copy preserved in its contemporary red morocco with the arms of King Louis XV.
