“BOOKS OF CONSEQUENCE… IN ELEGANT DRESS”: FIRST BASKERVILLE MILTON, 1758, BOUND IN FULL MOROCCO

MILTON, John. Paradise Lost. WITH: Paradise Regain'd. Birmingham: Printed by John Baskerville for J. and R. Tonson, 1758. Two volumes. Octavo, 20th-century full olive straight-grain morocco gilt, elaborately gilt-decorated spines, raised bands, gilt dentelles, all edges gilt. $6000.

First Baskerville Press edition of Milton’s Paradise Lost—"one of the greatest poems in the English language"—and other works, handsomely bound by H. Sotheran.

First published in 1667, "Paradise Lost is generally conceded to be one of the greatest poems in the English language; and there is no religious epic in English which measures up to Milton's masterpiece… Milton performed an artist's service to his God" (Magill, 511, 515). The sequel, Paradise Regained, followed in 1671. This first Baskerville Press edition of Milton (followed by 1759 and 1760 editions) occupies a notable place in the history of printing, for it carries Baskerville's three-page preface to Paradise Lost in which he states his aims and ideals as a fine printer and comments on type, ink and other elements of his craft—his only such published statement: "It is not my desire to print many books; but such only as are books of Consequence… which the public may be pleased to see in an elegant dress…" This edition, from the text of Thomas Newton, also includes Sampson Agonistes, Poems on Several Occasions and a 49-page Life of Milton (the latter bound herein in Volume II). Text of volume II in first state with header errors uncorrected. Text of volume I in second state, with pagination on page 135 and header on page 346 corrected; "h" in "God his light" erased by hand on page 75. Simultaneously issued in quarto. Gaskell 4a, 5a. ESTC T133903, T134224.

Contents clean; spines evenly sunned to brown as often seen with green morocco. A strikingly attractive set.