Books

Large 8vo. [3], iv-xii, [1], 2-593, [1], [2] (pages of publisher's advertisements), [2] pp. Brown cloth with decorations in blind on the boards, lettering and publisher's device in gilt on the spine. Evans 46-4655. Macminn, Hainds, and McCrimmon 56. Oxford DNB, Jose Harris, "Mill, John Stuart (1806-1873)." A dense thesis divided into six books. Mill discusses various types of knowledge, propositions, fallacies, and writes on the use of logic for moral and social sciences. The Oxford DNB offers a comment on the history of the publication: "On its initial publication in 1843 A System of Logic attracted little public comment, a silence that betokened, according to one contemporary, R. H. Hutton, not lack of interest but sheer terror among the book-reviewing community at the thought of incurring the crossfire of Mill's dialectical powers. Within a very few years, however, it was to become one of the most influential and controversial works of the mid-nineteenth century." A discoloration on the front board, rubbing to the boards' edges, a crossed-out name on the title page and some foxing to the leaves.

'A System of Logic' establishes the principles of scientific reasoning and logic developed by Mill.