MERCURIUS POLITICUS: BEING MONTHLY OBSERVATIONS ON THE AFFAIRS OF GREAT BRITAIN, WITH THE MOST MATERIAL OCCURRENCES IN EUROPE FOR THE MONTH OF APRIL, 1719

London: Printed for J. Moore near St. Paul's, 1719. First Edition. Original Sewn Wrappers. Very Good binding. One of Defoe's infamous pamphlets, published under his second period of employment by the British government as a literary fifth columnist. Defoe would publish political or current event pamphlets, either anonymously or posing as a Whig, Tory, Jacobite, whom he said "my very soul abhors" (DNB 738), or even a repentant double agent, all while writing revolutionary works that lacked their bite, incendiary news which proved incorrect, or polemical pieces with unsound arguments. In short, he worked a a pamphleteering agent of chaos, all in the service of the government, pacifying their erstwhile opponents. Defoe was seen as a renegade, traitor, and spy by a number of his contemporaries: "the little art he is truly a master of, of forging a story and imposing it on the world." (DNB 737). Mercurius Politicus was published in the years shortly before his fantastical Robinson Crusoe. The periodical ran from May 1716 to December 1720; this being the April 1719 issue. Published two months before the Battle of Glen Shiel in Scotland against the Spanish and Jacobites, with "various accounts of the Spanish Fleet" and "of the landing in Scotland," as well as an intriguing mention of 'Old Blackbeard.' Sewn pamphlet, lacking original paper wrappers. 193-263 pp. (ESTC P2105. DNB V, 737-738). Very Good binding. (Inventory #: 284580)