Jean Gautier de Faget, sous les initiales J. G. D. M. F. M. - Relation apologique et historique, contenant l’Ordre & l’établissement de la Société des - 1738

Good copy.

Rare original 1738 edition of this important defense of Freemasonry, generally attributed to the physician and writer Jean Gautier de Faget. The work constitutes one of the first French texts devoted to the defense and description of the Society of Freemasons. It notably outlines the organization of the society, its assemblies and the ceremonies associated with the reception of a new member.

IRONIC ANSWER TO THE CRITICISMS AGAINST FREEMASONRY, notably those of René Hérault, inspector of the judicial police who, in December 1737, published a disclosure of Masonic secrets in order to ridicule them, to present them as burdened with prejudices and as based on erroneous sources. The present Relation, which defends English Freemasonry in its deistic, academic and Epicurean form, was the only Masonic publication indexed in 1739. It also appeared that same year in the Luxembourg periodical La Clef du cabinet.

DOCTOR TRAINED IN PARIS, JEAN GAUTIER DE FAGET, author of this relation according to Jean Sgard, led a roaming life in Europe. In London in the 1720s, he frequented French Protestant scholars linked to the Freemasons, and met the Abbot Prévost whom he followed into the United Provinces as secretary. He later resumed a roaming life, his presence being notably attested in Paris in 1738-1740, where he probably published the present Relation under the fictitious address of Dublin.

Copy featuring a binding in brown half-leather with boards covered in domed/marbled paper, dating from after the edition.

Good copy.