De Rerum Natura
Titi Lucretii Cari De Rerum Natura Libri Sex: ex Editione Thomae Creech
by Titus Lucretius Carus
Titus Lucretius Carus (c.99-c.55BCE), known simply as Lucretius, was a Roman poet and ardent believer in the physical system of Epicurus.[1] The Epicurean philosophy is a “strictly mechanistic account of all phenoma” that atoms, which are extremely small, are unchanging and indestructible and make up everything in the world from physical objects to the mind to the soul.[2] Everything in the world is made up of these atomic compounds—including the gods who should be respected and admired but are not responsible for nature—which disperse and then form something else when a being dies.[3] Besides his philosopher status, little is known about Lucretius though various contemporary writers claim knowledge of him.[4]
De Rerum Natura, or “On Nature,” the only known work of Lucretius, is a poem in six books which is also the best surviving work explaining Epicureanism though the sources are unknown and it is unlikely to include Epicurus’s own work.[5] “The purpose of the poem is to free men from a sense of guilt and the fear of death by demonstrating that fear of the intervention of gods in this world and of punishment of the soul after death are groundless: the world and everything in it are material and governed by the mechanical laws of nature, and the soul is mortal and perishes with the body.”[6] Lucretius wrote with a clear and organizational purpose as even “[the] division of the text corresponds to the Epicurean stress on the intelligibility of phenomena: everything has a systematic explanation, the world can be analysed and understood.”[7] Each book has a prologue and a conclusion, with a greater prologue in Book 1 which “opens with a famous invocation of Venus, goddess of creative life, to grant to the poet inspiration and to Rome peace.”[8] Book 6 was intended as the final book, demonstrated by the explicit statement to that end in the prologue, though it was likely incomplete at Lucretius’s death and therefore published as it was.[9]
This work is an edition of Lucretius’s De Rerum Natura published in 1759 by two well-known and regarded Scottish publishers. Robert and Andrew Foulis (ne Faulls) were brothers who opened their own publishing company and printing press in 18th century Glasgow.[10] Robert was a barber before enrolling in University of Glasgow courses, while Andrew “received a more regular education…[as] a student of Humanity” who taught Greek, Latin and French for a time after he graduated.[11] The brothers began as booksellers and then transitioned to publishing and printing books, with Robert initiating each endeavor before later being joined by Andrew.[12] In 1740-42, Robert had other printers print what he chose to publish, but began printing his own books in 1742 which continued until his and his brother’s deaths in 1775 and 1776, respectively, when Andrew’s son Andrew took over The Foulis Press.[13] The Foulis Press primarily produced text books and other “works of learning…and of general literature,” as it was the printer to the University of Glasgow.[14] The press is unique for the plethora of variant issues and editions of published books on special paper, in special font, or even on copper plates.[15]
| De Rerum Natura | |
 Title page from De Rerum Natura, George Wythe Collection, Wolf Law Library, College of William & Mary. | |
| Author | Titus Lucretius Carus |
| Published | Glasguae: In Aedibus Academicis : Excudebant Robertus et Andreas Foulis ... |
| Date | 1759 |
| Language | Latin |
Evidence for Inclusion in Wythe's Library
Description of the Wolf Law Library's copy
Bound in contemporary full brown calf. Spine features red morocco label, gilt lettering and decoration. Gilt rolls to board edges.
References
- ↑ "Lucrē'tius” in The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature, ed. by M.C. Howatson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).
- ↑ "Epicū'rus” in The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature, ed. by M.C. Howatson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ "Lucrē'tius”
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ "Lucrētius" in Oxford Dictionary of the Classical World, ed. by John Roberts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).
- ↑ "Lucrē'tius”
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ David Murray, Robert & Andrew Foulis and the Glasgow Press with some account of The Glasgow Academy of the Fine Arts (Glasgow: James Maclehose and Sons, Publishers to the University), 8.
- ↑ Ibid at 3.
- ↑ Ibid 6-10.
- ↑ Philip Gaskell, A Bibliography of the Foulis Press, 2nd ed. (Winchester, Hampshire, England: St Paul's Bibliographies, 1986), 190.
- ↑ Ibid 17-18.
- ↑ Ibid 18-19.
