Two instructive devotional works by didactic Jesuit writer Matthias Schönberg (1732-92) in an unusual rococo binding; gilt-stamped cartouches on the upper and lower covers depict a stoic-looking St John the Evangelist standing in a cauldron, with flames licking at its sides. According to his hagiography, Saint John was thrown into a pot of boiling oil on the orders of the Emperor Domitian, but miraculously emerged unscathed.
A prolific writer, present here are two of von Schönberg’s instructive and educational religious tracts (of the nearly forty he wrote): the first, the first edition of Vom widrigen und glücklichen Schicksale, on bad and good fortune, concerning the guidance of divine providence in human destiny. The second work is the first edition of Schönberg’s partial account of Church prohibition of books and heretical works, with an engraved title page signed by Georg Michael Weissenhahn (1741-95) depicting an episode from the ministry of St Paul at Ephesus, Christian converts burning books containing magic.
Manuscript inscription of Aloysius Rettenmayr or Kettenmayr, dated 1789, to front free endpaper, press mark 262405 inscribed above it, the same on upper cover and spine.
Sporadic foxing, otherwise an attractive copy.
I. Sommervogel VII 845, no.28. VD18 12577162. II. Sommervogel VII 846, no.34. Not in VD18.
P. Stoll, ‘Münchener Buchillustration zwischen Rokoko und Klassizismus: Die Schriften Matthias Schönbergs, ihre Illustrationen und der Anteil von Thomas Christian und Johann Amandus Wink’, Augsburg, 2007 [open access via Universität Augsburg].
