GROSVENOR (B.). Health. An essay on its Nature, Value, Uncertainty, preservation and best improvement. London, Printed for H. Piers, 1748. Small 8vo, contemporary full calf binding, spine with 5 raised bands, xii-244 pp.; good copy, leather missing on the spine and front cover, joints partially split, corners rubbed
Second edition of this treatise on health of dissenting minister and social reformer Benjamin Grosvenor (1676–1758). It is one of the earliest works on general hygiene in English with a cache of didactical anecdotes, including an account of King Louis XIV’s obsession with life extension, an anecdote which shows the centrality of longevity to eighteenth-century high culture.
