Systême de la Nature. ou Des Loix du Monde Physique & du Monde Moral (The System of Nature. or The Laws of the Physical and Moral World) by HOLBACH, Baron Paul von - 1770

'Londres' [i.e. Amsterdam]: [M.M. Rey], 1770. First printing. Very Good. “The Bible of Materialism”HOLBACH, Baron Paul von. Systême de la Nature. ou Des Loix du Monde Physique & du Monde Moral (The System of Nature. or The Laws of the Physical and Moral World), “par M. Mirabaud”, [printer unidentified], Londres [Amsterdam], 1770. In two volumes: Volume 1: 1 blank leaf + half-title + TP + 2 pp. = Avis de l’Editeur + 4 pp. = Preface de l’Autuer + 2 pp. = Table des Chapitres + [1] – [370] + 1 blank leaf; Volume 2: 1 blank leaf + TP + 2 pp. = Table des Chapitres + [1] – 412 + 4 pp. = errata1 blank leaf; small Octavo. First Edition, First Printing. Vercruysse 1770, A-6.This is the true first edition with the correct pagination and the comma after “Londres”. Also included here is the rarely seen 4-page “Errata” at the end of volume 1 -- which was added during the printing process when the mistakes were first discovered. Holbach contributed some four hundred articles to the Encyclopédie of his lifelong friend and colleague, Denis Diderot. Diderot, d’Alembert, Helvetius, Voltaire and others of the philosophes met frequently for dinner and philosophical discussion at the Baron’s house, which became known as “the café of Europe” (among whose foreign visitors were Wilkes, Hume and Sterne).In the Systême Holbach rejected the Cartesian mind-body dualism and attempted to explain all phenomena, physical and mental, in terms of matter in motion. Holbach rejected religion because he saw it as a wholly harmful influence, and he tried to supply a desirable alternative. In fact, he outlined a whole ethical and political philosophy – which is expanded in his later works. Holbach was “the foremost exponent of atheistic materialism, and the most intransigent polemicist against religion in the Enlightenment.” (EP, Vol. 4, p. 49) “He could not publish safely under his own name, but had the ingenious idea of using the names of recently dead French authors. Thus, in 1770, his most famous book, ‘The System of Nature’, appeared under the name of Jean-Baptiste Mirabaud” (PMM, p. 130) “The third and properly philosophical stage of Holbach’s output began in 1770 with [this work]. This first – and only – example in the Enlightenment of a comprehensive, unmitigated defense of atheistic materialism was the culmination of a whole trend of ideas already expressed in varying degrees by La Mettrie, Helvetius, Diderot, and others. It caused much consternation in France, not only among spokesmen for the official faith but among the deistic philosophes as well. It was suppressed by judicial decree, and among the flood of refutations it provoked were those of Voltaire.. and Frederick the Great.” (EP, Vol. 4, p. 50)CONDITION: Very good. Contemporary quarter calf marbled boards.. Gilt lettering to spine with title and volume numbers on fields of red. Spines of both volumes with a bit of sun-fading. Pages bright and clean. Tightly bound. A lovely, clean and crisp copy of Holbach’s most important work.

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