SEBOND, Raymond.

Lot 1222
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SEBOND, Raymond.
Natural Theology. Newly translated into Francoys by messire Michel, lord of Montaigne, knight of the king's order, & ordinary gentleman of his chamber. Paris, Michel Sonnius, 1581. In-8 (175 x 110 mm) of 2 ff.n.ch., 496 ff.ch. (wrong numbers 469), 30 ff.n.ch. (index); soft ivory vellum with flaps, smooth spine with manuscript title, traces of laces (contemporary binding). Second edition of the famous translation by Michel de Montaigne. Printed by the same editors as the first one - the privilege was shared between Guillaume Chaudiere, Gilles Gourbin and Michel Sonnius - it is very carefully purged of many errors by Montaigne who also deleted the sonnet by Francois Ambroise. ? This work and its translation by Montaigne benefited from several reeditions until the middle of the seventeenth century, giving the expression 'natural theology' the status of a subgenre of eclectically inspired metaphysics (Saint Thomas, Saint Augustine, Saint Anselm, Saint Bonaventure, Damascene, Raymond Lulle...). It is not yet known which text Montaigne followed: perhaps the rather 'rationalist' edition of Richard Paffroed (ca. 1485), or an unknown manuscript, other than that of Toulouse, authenticated by a notary at the death of the author. In his preface to the translation, Montaigne considers the style to be 'fierce' and 'barbaric', and, while expressing his concern for stylistic improvement and fidelity to the original, he nevertheless seems to read Sebond with an attenuation of his anthropocentrism, on the basis of which the theologian had developed a system of reading the Book from nature prior to that of the Scriptures, which did not fail to arouse reservations and an indexing of the prologue (1564). He sometimes insists so much on the scales of beings that one would think of an ironic translation, such as the modern reader might judge in the light of the Essays. The use of modellers, as when 'ergo concluditur' is replaced by 'it is probable that', or the
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