Moyens de prevenir les crimes dans la society

Grenoble: Ferry, 1799. FIRST EDITION. presentation copy Bound in later marbled paper with marbled edges. Fine condition; inscribed by Mauclerc on the title page, “à Monsieur Vigaroux professeur de l’école de Montpellier. Comme preuve de reconnaissance H.V. Mauclerc.”. First edition, the author’s presentation copy. This moving essay extolls the virtues of love and friendship as central to preventing crime and violence. Written in wake of the Revolution, Mauclerc dedicates the work to Napoleon and prefaces it with excerpt from Beccaria’s famous 1764 treatise against capital punishment, Dei delitti e delle pene (On crimes and punishment).

He begins the essay by strongly condemning the violence inflicted by the First Republic. “French society has become one where a ten-year-old girl can take a knife to two grown men, murdering them in cold blood.” In general, the criminal, Mauclerc continues, has submitted to complete and total independence, distancing himself completely from community and religion. Mauclerc uses Athens and Rome as case studies to showcase how love, friendship, and a common sense of community can stop the moral decay of a society.

Mauclerc (1764/65-1837) was a French physician. He was interested in moral philosophy and the issue of love and friendship. This was his first publication, which he followed with Offrande à l’amitié (Grenoble: Peyronard, 1813).

This copy is inscribed by the author to Joseph-Marie Joachim Vigarous de Montagut (1759-1829), professor of medicine at Montpellier. He also served as the chief physician of the general hospital of Montpellier and was a member of the Société libre d'agriculture and the Société Médicale d'Émulation de Paris.

OCLC locates 3 copies in America (The Morgan, Library of Congress, University of Maryland).