Jean de la Bruyère / Pierre Coste - Les Caractères de Théophraste, avec les Caractéres ou les mœurs de ce siècle. Avec la défense - 1740

New edition, identical to the last (1739) given by Pierre Coste (1688-1747), considered 'the most accurate of all,' which will serve as a model for the numerous editions that followed in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first edition by Coste dates from 1720.

Adorned with a beautiful frontispiece and two title vignettes engraved by J-B. Scotin.

Full calf bindings from the period, spine with nerves decorated with fleurons and small gilded tools, title and volume pieces in leather with gilded initials. Red edges. Titles printed in red and black. Typographic ornaments.
In very good condition. Solid bindings with bright gilding, a 1cm tear starting at the first flyleaf. Minor wear on the covers and corners, the headband of volume II is missing. Interior is fresh and clean, with well-white paper and few foxing spots. A fine copy.

La Bruyère (1645-1696) conceived his 'Characters' based on a translation of Theophrastus. In it, he depicts the decline of the society in which he lived, along with its new customs. Admitted to the Académie française in 1693, he participated in the debate between the Ancients and the Moderns as a fervent defender of the Ancients.

Bibliography: The first edition of Les Caractères was published in March 1688, under the title: The Characters of Theophrastus, translated from Greek, with the Characters or the customs of this century. In Paris, at Étienne Michallet's. Although this first edition mainly contained remarks and almost no portraits, the success was immediately very lively, and two other editions appeared in the same year, 1688, without La Bruyère having the time to significantly expand them. Conversely, the 4th edition (1689) included more than 350 unpublished characters; the fifth (1690), over 150; the sixth (1691) and the seventh (1692), nearly 80 each; the eighth (1693), more than 40, to which must be added the speech at the Academy. Only the 9th edition (1696), published a few days after La Bruyère's death but revised and corrected by him, contained nothing new.

Jean de la Bruyère
The Characters of Theophraste, with the Characters or the customs of this century, by M. de La Bruyère. New edition, augmented with some notes on these two works and the Defense of M. de La Bruyère, and his Characters. By M. Coste. Volume one [-second]
Amsterdam at F. Changuion, 1741. Two volumes in in-12 format, comprising 494 pages + 579 pages + 4 pages of front matter.