Greatest Book of the 19th Century
On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
London: John Murray, 1859.
Full Description:
DARWIN, Charles. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. London, John Murray, 1859.
First edition first issue. With two quotations on p. [ii]. Octavo (7 3/4 x 4 7/8 inches; 198 x 125 mm). ix, [1], [1]-502, 32 pp. Publisher's advertisements dated June 1859. One folding diagram.
Original green diagonal wave-grain cloth, decoratively stamped in blind on covers. Spine decorated and lettered in gilt. Brown coated endpapers. Corners very slightly rubbed. Bookplate to front pastedown. Front inner hinge cracked but firm, rear inner hinge just starting. Tiny short tears to top and bottom of spine from shelf-wear, else fine. A clean, fresh, and bright copy. Housed in a custom green cloth clamshell. Overall, a near fine good copy of Darwin's greatest achievement that created a revolution in biology and in almost every department of thought. Housed in a full green morocco clamshell case.
One of the most influential scientific works of the nineteenth century, On the Origina of Species was (and still is) one of the most controversial. In it “Darwin not only drew an entirely new picture of the workings of organic nature; he revolutionized our methods of thinking and our outlook on the natural order of things. The recognition that constant change is the order of the universe had been finally established and a vast step forward in the uniformity of nature had been taken” (Printing and the Mind of Man).
Dibner 199. Freeman 373 (“the most important biological book ever written”). Garrison and Morton 220. Grolier, 100 English, 96. Grolier/Horblit 23b (“the most influential scientific work of the nineteenth century”). Printing and the Mind of Man 344b.
HBS 69648.
$325,000.
Price: $325,000.00
Item #69648