FRIER BACON HIS DISCOVERY OF THE MIRACLES OF ART, NATURE, AND MAGICK

London: Simon Miller, 1659. First Edition. Hardcover. Minor foxing, pencil notes on endpapers; small chip to head of spine. Near Fine and very scarce. Small duodecimo (3-1/8" x 5-1/2") bound in early calf with gilt-ruled covers and gilt decoration and lettering on the spine; [xii], 51, [7 - ads] pages. First separate printing and First English Edition of Roger Bacon's letter to William of Paris that first appeared in Dee's BACON'S EPISTOLAE, published in Hamburg in 1618. Bacon begins this long essay denying the existence of magic, but concludes showing how to create a "Philosophers Egg." He writes about optics, gunpowder (Bacon is believed to have introduced gunpowder--a Chinese invention--to the West), and petroleum in warfare. Bacon makes some bold futurist statements such as “admirable Artificial Instruments” of locomotion (“It's possible to make a Chariot move with an inestimable swiftnesse and this motion to be without the help of any living creature”), of flight (“It's possible to make Engines for flying, a man sitting in the midst whereof, by turning onely about an Instrument, which moves artificiall Wings made to beat the Aire”), and diving (“A man may make an Engine, whereby without any corporal danger, he may walk in the bottome of the Sea, or other water”). Bookplate of Lord Northwick on front pastedown.