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Title: Voiage Du Monde de Descartes Author: [Daniel, Gabriel] Place: Paris Publisher: Veuve de Simon Bernard [Mare Dallin] Date: 1690 Description: [xxviii], 11-437, [1 errata] pp. Double-page map, a few woodcuts in text. (12mo) 16x9.5 cm (6¾x3¾") period full mottled calf, spine gilt, edges speckled red. First Edition. Gabriel Daniel, historian and controversialist, (1649-1728). In 1683, Daniel was assigned to the professed house of Paris where his extraordinary talents resulted in his being appointed historiographer of France by Louis XIV. Later bookplate of Guyot de St. Michel. Manuscript leaf with a short biography of Daniel inserted at front. "The idea of the separation of soul from body, reflected in eighteenth-century 'trance' and 'ectasy' often went back to the Cartesian separation of 'mind' and 'matter.' On this theme Gabriel Daniel wrote a full-length cosmic voyage, as well known in England as it was in France.... Descartes, his disciple learned, was not dead, but separated from the matter he had separated from mind, dwelt aloft in an intellectual world of his own creation.... Descartes had reached the new sphere, by an 'Act of Will,' but since unfortunately the 'Will' of his disciple was less potent, he depended for motive power upon a peculiar kind of snuff... On went this disembodied spirit, gaily flying off to explore the indefinite Cartesian universe, after many adventures to arrive in outer space where he found M. Descartes still busily engaged in correcting the mistakes of the Almighty!" [Marjorie Nicolson, Voyages to the Moon.] Lot Amendments Condition: Binding rubbed, joints starting; very good. Item number: 288158