"A mans life is not to be trifled away, it is to be offered up and sacrificed to honourable services… and noble adventures"
BACON, Francis. The charge of Sir Francis Bacon knight, His Majesties attourney generall, touching duells, upon an information in the Star-chamber against Priest and Wright. With the decree of the Star-chamber in the same cause. [London:] Printed [by George Eld] for Robert Wilson, and are to be sold [by Robert Wilson and W. Bladen] at Graies Inne Gate, and in Paules Churchyard at the signe of the Bible. 1614.
Small 4to. 19th-century pale brown morocco by Riviere & Son, spine lettered in gilt, richly gilt turn-ins, gilt edges; pp. [3], 6-61, [1 (blank)], woodcut initials and headpieces; extremities lightly rubbed; bound without first and last blanks (as usual), f. G with small abrasion affecting a few letters of text, but overall very good. Provenance: armorial bookplate of Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby to front pastedown; bookplate of the Fox Pointe collection to front free endpaper; pencil collation inscription, signed by F.S. Ferguson on behalf of Quaritch and dated 1913 to rear pastedown.
First edition, very rare, of Francis Bacon's essay against the practice of duelling, handsomely bound by Riviere & Son for the library of Edward George Geoffrey Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby (1799-1869), three times Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
Francis Bacon's scathing essay on the practice of duels condemns it as a wasteful and dishonourable way of resolving disputes - moreover one which endangers both secular and religious authority. This text is an important and rare part of the tapestry in James I's anti-duelling campaign in the 1610s, fuelled by a series of high profile combats between important politicians and figures of note in the summer and autumn of 1613. Among his first actions as attorney-general, 'Bacon suggested that a proclamation should be published against duelling, proposing that the offenders should be prosecuted in star chamber. In January [1614] he brought a convenient case of two obscure persons before the court [the 'Priest' and 'Wright' named in the book's title]. Bacon's charge, together with the decree of the court, was soon published' (ODNB).
Among the texts from the Jacobean anti-duelling campaign, Bacon's The charge touching duells stands out not only as a condemnation of the practice itself, but also as a rebuke to the very notion of 'disputes of honour' that fuelled it in the first place. While contemporaries like Henry Howard, the Earl of Northampton, sought alternative ways to resolve matters of honour, Bacon believed that acknowledging such claims only encouraged escalating acts of violence.
ESTC S121055; Gibson 102
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