[Holbach, Paul-Henri Thiry, Baron d']

Système de la Nature. Ou Des Loix du Monde Physique & du Monde Moral. Par M. Mirabaud. London (i.e. Amsterdam: Marc-Michel Rey], 1770



2 volumes, 8vo (8 ¾ x 5 ½ in.; 223 x 140 mm, uncut). Vignette of printer's ornaments on titles. Contemporary wrappers, manuscript title label on one spine. Card slipcase.

Goldsmiths 10607; Kress 6737; PMM 215

First edition, first issue, with a comma after "Londres" in the imprint, with the two errata leaves, and with the errors uncorrected.

Paul Heinrich Dietrich, Baron von Holbach (1723-1789) contributed some four hundred articles to the Encyclopédie of his friend Denis Diderot, with whom he met d'Alembert, Helvetius, and Voltaire, all of whom gathered at the Baron's house for dinner and discussion. This is his most famous and influential work in which he developed a complete theory of materialism. Published under the name of the late Mirabaud to avoid censure, he attempted to explain all phenomena, mental and physical, in terms of matter in motion. He attacked religion by attempting to show that it derived entirely from habit and custom. "Holbach rejected religion because he saw it as a wholly harmful influence, and he tried to supply a more desirable alternative. In fact, he outlined a whole ethical and political philosophy ... It was his aim to derive a morality and an ethic from a completely materialistic and atheistic basis" (PMM).