Sunday School, The: History of Hester Wilmot, The. 4 items.
Seven Scarce Tracts
[More, Hannah]. The Sunday School. London: Sold by J. Marshall, (Printer to the CHEAP REPOSITORY for Religious and Moral Tracts)…, (1797).
Two vols., 12mo.; additional page numbers from 464 to 479 in ink on the top of each page; foxed and browned; printed wrappers, sewn; edgeworn. In a specially made cloth slipcase.
Together with:
[More, Hannah]. The History of Hester Wilmot; Or, the Second Part of the Sunday School. London: Sold by J. Marshall, (Printer to the CHEAP REPOSITORY for Religious and Moral Tracts)…, (1797).
12mo.; additional page numbers from 480 to 495 in ink on the top of each page; lightly foxed; printed wrappers, sewn; edgeworn; fragile.
First editions, signed by More (in type) as “Z” on the last page of the text; title pages feature a woodcut signed “Lee.” OCLC locates three copies of the first part, at the University of Texas, UCLA, and Pennsylvania State University; OCLC lists five copies of the second part.
Spinney notes the date as 1797; ESTC claims it was published in 1796 (Spinney, G.H. Cheap repository tracts (The Library, 4th ser., v. 20, no. 3, Dec. 1939, p. [295]-340); ESTC; t048914). The 1797 date seems more likely, as according to the two pages of advertisements at the rear of Hester Wilmot noting tracts published during the years 1795 and 1796, these two installments are not included.
Boxed together with:
[More, Hannah]. The History of Hester Wilmot. In two parts. [continuously paginated with:] Part II. The New Gown. Long-Lane, Smithfield (London): Sold by J. Evans and Sons (Printers to the CHEAP REPOSITORY for Moral and Religious Tracts)…, (ca. 1800).
12mo.; 24 pp; lightly foxed; printed wrappers, sewn.
Another edition; with unattributed woodcut on title page of first part, different than the woodcuts in Evans’ editions in individual volumes; signed by More (in type) as “Z” on the last page of the second part. OCLC lists no copies of this edition; and an entry for a reel of microfilm describes this book as having 28 pages, though our copy has 24.
Boxed together with:
More, Hannah. The Sunday School. Sold by Howard and Evans, (ca. 1810).
12mo.; 16 pp.
Bound together with:
More, Hannah. The History of Hester Wilmot, or the Second Part of the Sunday School. Sold by Howard and Evans, (ca. 1810).
12mo.; 16 pp.
Bound together with:
More, Hannah. The History of Hester Wilmot; Or, the New Gown: Being a Continuation of the Sunday School. Part II. West-Smithfield (London): Sold by Howard and Evans, (ca. 1810).
12mo.; 16 pp.; all together in unprinted wrappers; lightly browned and spotted.
First editions; each title page features a woodcut illustration, though different than the ones that appear in Marshall’s editions; with one page of publishers advertisements at the conclusion of The Second Part of the Sunday School; all stories signed by More (in type), “Z.” OCLC lists one copy of The Sunday School, and two copies each of The Second Part of the Sunday School and The New Gown. Our set was likely bound together by a contemporary owner in these plain brown wrappers.
Hannah More is best known for her Cheap Repository Tracts, of which she wrote nearly fifty. S.J. Skedd explains that More was encouraged to write these tracts during the French Revolution to counter “revolutionary politics circulating in cheap editions of Tom Paine’s Rights of Man.” After the first tract was published – titled, Village Politics: addressed to all the mechanics, journeymen, and day laborers, in Great Britain (1792) – her friend, the Angelican Bishop Beilby Porteus, suggested she write more. Skedd continues,
She was hesitant about writing such an overtly political work, yet the threat of revolution and war impelled her to write dozens of similarly loyalist, moral and Christian tales specifically for the lower classes that were published anonymously as Cheap Repository Tracts (1795-1798). A total of 114 tract
Print Inquire