The Christian Hero: an Argument Proving that No Principles but those of Religion are Sufficient to Make a Great Man.
London: Jacob Tonson, 1701.
Price: $750.00
About the item
First edition. [xvi], 95, [1] pp, with ad leaf bound after title. 12mo. Contemporary blind-stamped sheep. Joints starting. Ashley V, p. 199; ESTC T120081; Rothschild 1947.
Item #308148
First edition of Steele's first prose work, preceded only by his poem The Procession (1695), known in just a handful of copies. "Nine editions and a French translation appeared in [Steele's] lifetime, twenty-two between 1701 and 1820" (Rothschild). This copy with the leaf of Tonson ads (A1), which is often blank or removed, but here bound-in following the title (A2). Steele's work "decries neostoicism with its emphasis on pagan virtues and celebrates, as the title indicates, the Christian hero, especially as exemplified by the soldier king William" (ODNB).
