Second revised edition. 8vo. Original flexible boards with printed title-slip, minor wear, but overall a very good copy. [ii], 51ff. Hong Kong, London Missionary Society Press, 1864.
Legge (1815-1897) lived in China for close to 25 years before becoming the first Professor of Chinese Studies at Oxford University. The present is a rare text-book for the use of young Chinese students wishing to improve their English. “The object of the present work is to supply a series of elementary lessons suitable both for school and for home instruction. A more comprehensive and systematic arrangement of subjects has been attempted than any at present existing in the English language, and a method of graduating the lessons has been adopted which accommodates the series to children of different degrees of advancement.” (Preface, p. i) But more than that it is an introduction into Western modes of thought starting with a definition of objects, creatures, and human beings and ending with a definition of God. The first edition was printed in Hong Kong in 1856 (3 copies in OCLC). Only a further 3 copies of the 2nd revised edition in OCLC.
