London : Printed by T.N. for Henry Herringman, at the Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange. 1674. First Edition
8vo, A8, a4, B-Q8, A-C8, last leaf blank, (lacking the second 10-line errata sometimes inserted after the second title-page), the second title-page a cancel beginning “About the Excellency...”, general title a little stained with a very small piece missing from lower blank margin, antique-style calf, morocco label, a good copy with ample margins.
“[He} was much worried by the materialism of his age, feeling that his friends the ‘Virtuosi of the Royal Society had, in their ardent pursuit of ‘Natural Philosophy’, forgotten the Supreme Author of Nature. Boyle accordingly enjoins them to the study of Divine Revelation.” - Fulton p.81
In the second tract he attempts to justify his theory of the Universe (i.e. ‘matter in motion’). “ This is one of the most readable expositions of his Theory” - Fulton p.82.
Reference: Wing B 3955 Fulton 116

London: Printed for T. Cadell in the Stand. 1770. First Edition, first issue
8vo, (210x130mm) 53, [1] pp, (lacks half-title), disbound, inserted into sugar-paper wrappers, a good, clean copy
The first of two political pamphlets written by Johnson while living with the Thrales at Streatham Park; it is a fierce, legal argument in defence of Parliament’s rejection of John Wilkes’ election as MP for Middlesex and, according to Mrs Thrale, it was Johnson’s favourite pamphlet.
Rare on the market. Of the four impressions printed in 1770 this is the first, according with all the issue points ennumerated by Todd. “As is common with such small pamphlets the half-title is often missing”- Fleeman
Reference: ESTC T89378 Todd: "Concealed editions of Samuel Johnson", ’Book Collector’,Vol. 2(1953)pp.59-60 Fleeman 70.1FA/1a

London : Printed for the Author; and Sold by W. Flexney, near Gray’s-Inn Gate, Holborn. 1763. 4to, [4], 62pp, 1 leaf, [5], 68-102, 105-126pp, [5], 128-213, [1]pp, [A]2, B-Q2, R2+2, (R2 blank) S-Z2, Aa-Ii2+2, Kk-Zz2, Aaa-Hhh2, four books in one volume, separate title-pages to Books 3 and 4, uncut, cased in antique-style grey paper boards.
All four books are signed and paginated continuously. The separate titlepages to Books 3 and 4 are as follows :- Book III. The Second Edition, with Additions. London. Printed for the Author; and Sold by W. Flexney... 1763, and Book IV. London: Printed for J. Coote... W. Flexney... G. Kearsley... T. Henderson... J. Gardner... and J. Almon... 1763. Book IV is in first edition.
The subject of this satirical poem is the Cock Lane Ghost, a famous fraud in which the ghost of Mrs. Kent was said to have appeared in Cock Lane, Smithfield. Doctor Johnson took an interest in it and is savagely attacked under the name “Pomposo (insolent and loud)” (p.55 et seq.)
Reference: ESTC T74515, N7618, T9714 Courtney & Smith pps 100 & 104

London: Printed by Adam Islip, Joice Norton and Richard Whitakers, 1633. Folio, (350 x 230mm) *8, ** - ***6, A-B8, C-Z6, Aa-Zz6, Aaa-Zzz6, 4A-4Z6, 5A-5Z6, 6A-6V6, 6X4, 6Y-6Z6, 7a-7b6 (lacking first blank, but the last blank looks genuine and has a minute wormhole matching the last gatherings), Engraved title, prelims. [xxxvi], text pp. 1-[1632], indices, 23 leaves, profusely illustrated with woodcuts of plants throughout the text, small rusthole in foremargin of title and next 4 leaves [see image], bound in 20c. antique-style sprinkled calf, 6 raised bands, titled in gilt direct to the spine in 2nd compartment, ffep from the previous binding(?). Provenance : Inscription on upper blank margin of the title-page “Johne Levingstonii awcht this book 5 May 1634”. A fine, clean and very tall copy [A1 retains a deckle fore-edge).
The ownership inscription proved to be a teaser, and I wish to thank David Pearson for suggesting a Scottish owner and Bill Zachs for identifying the word awcht as being Middle Scots for “owns”

“Johnson’s Gerarde”, with 2765 woodcuts, is almost half as long again as the first edition (1597) and is, in every respect, immeasurably superior to its predecessor. In a Catalogue of Additions Johnson says “I have thought good to give you the names of all such as are added either in figure or description, or both” and proceeds to give a list of some 880 additions. He was commissioned by the publishers to produce this amended and enlarged edition at short notice in order to forestall Parkinson’s Theatrum Botanicum, believed to be imminent, (it finally appeared in 1640), and he complains bitterly in his preface that he “was forced to performe this task within the compasse of a yeare”, - an almost superhuman effort. Almost all the woodcuts were from a different source from Gerarde’s, (mostly from Plantin’s stock), but some of the figures he drew himself, notably the famous bunch of bananas on page 1516. This had been given him on 10th April 1633 by Dr. Argent, President of the College of Physicians of London, who had received it from Bermuda. Johnson’s drawing is the first illustration of bananas to be published in England. Having drawn and described them, he says - “ the stalke with the fruit thereon I hanged up in my shop, where it became ripe about the beginning of May, and lasted until June” . The shop was in Snow Hill, in the City, and it must have been there also that John Payne studied this unknown fruit before incorporating it into his engraved title-page.
STC 11751 Blunt & Raphael: Illustrated Herbal [1979] p.166 et seq. Henrey. 155

London : Impensis G. B. 1601 [Vol. 2 Printed by Adam Islip, 1601]. First Edition in English
2 volumes in 1, folio, (324x208mm) [-]6, ❡4, a-b6, A8, B-Iii6, Kkk4, 357 leaves (lacking first blank), and A-Ggg6, Hhh4, Iii-Ooo6, Ppp8, 365 leaves (lacking last blank, Ppp2&7 in duplicate), cancel title to vol. 1 with imprint reading Impensis G.B.[ishop], occasional early ink marginalia and underlinings ,with an elegant cloverleaf nota mark, minor holes in vol.1 foremargin of V4 and in vol.2 lower margin of Dd3, none affecting text, 17th century full calf, triple fillet centre panels with floral cornerpieces in blind, spine fully gilt with stars, circles, and a distinctive carnation tool, title labels in 2nd and 3rd compartments, hinges sometime expertly renewed, a fine, tall and clean copy.
Written in the first century AD, Pliny's "Naturalis Historia" was essentially the highest authority for centuries on subjects relating to botany, zoology, geography, mineralogy, pharmacology, etc. It soon became a standard book of reference; abstracts and abridgements appeared by the third century. Bede owned a copy, Alcuin sent the early books to Charlemagne, and Dicuil, the Irish geographer, quotes him in the ninth century. It was the basis of Isidore's Etymologiae and such medieval encyclopedias as the Speculum Majus of Vincent of Beauvais and the Catholicon of Balbus. Holland is generally considered the greatest translator of the Elizabethan age. Lowndes regards this book as "A work of immense labour, and what few men of his time could have executed in a superior manner to Dr. Holland." It was claimed by Sir Sidney Lee to be ‘his most popular translation’.
STC (2nd ed.) 20029.5 [ESTC S115918] Pforzheimer 496 Lowndes p. 1885 McKerrow & Ferguson no.148