Church versus state
15 LOCKE, John. Epistola de Tolerantia. Gouda: Justus of Hoeve, 1689 £125,000
[ 158889 ]
Duodecimo (130 × 75 mm). Recent full vellum to style by James Brockman, manuscript lettering to spine. Housed in a custom black quarter morocco solander box. Printer’s ornament on title-page. Short horizontal split to head of title-page repaired. A very good copy. ¶ Attig 41; Christophersen, pp. 13–15; Harrison & Laslett 2941; Yolton 1. WorldCat and Yolton together locate only 24 copies worldwide.
Rare first edition of Locke’s first separately published work, his Letter on Toleration , in which he distinguishes exactly the business of civil government from that of religion. “In winter 1685–6 Locke interrupted his labours on the Essay to write another, shorter work. Louis XIV had revoked the edict of Nantes in October, removing the last remnants of toleration for the French protestants. The Epistola de tolerantia was written after Locke returned from Cleves about the beginning of November. It was addressed to Limborch, who kept the manuscript and subsequently arranged for it to be printed. The Latin text was published anonymously at Gouda in April 1689, two months after Locke had returned to England. The Epistola develops further the theory of toleration already put forward in the Essay Concerning Toleration of 1667 [written in 1667, but not published until 1876]. Locke advocated the complete separation of church and state: states exist only to preserve their members’ civil goods; churches are purely voluntary societies which are allowed to exercise discipline over their members, but which anyone can leave at any time without incurring any civil disabilities. Complete toleration should be given to every religious body whose doctrines are neither incompatible with civil society nor require their adherents to give allegiance to a foreign prince” ( ODNB ).
The most immediately striking aspect of the Fourth Folio is its height: Herringman and his co-publishers used a larger paper size to increase the number of lines per page and decrease the bulk of the book. Although this is the only edition in which each play does not start on a fresh page, it is in a larger font and more liberally spaced than the three earlier editions. (The two pages of L1 are set in smaller type, presumably after the discovery that some text had been omitted.) The printer of the Comedies has been identified from the ornaments as Robert Roberts. The Fourth Folio remained the favoured edition among collectors until the mid-18th century, when Samuel Johnson and Edward Capell argued for the primacy of the First Folio text.
Skilful paper restorations to blank margins of portrait, title and last two leaves of text, a few minor spots or marks, very good. ¶ Bartlett 123; Gregg III, p. 1121; Jaggard, p. 497; Pforzheimer 910; Wing S–2915.
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