SAMMELBAND ON PEACE WITH A RARE URBAN UTOPIA BY A FRIEND OF FOURIER
HAREL, Charles.
Ménage sociétaire ou Moyen d’augmenter son bien-être en diminuant sa dépense, avec indication de quelques nouvelles combinaisons pour améliorer et assurer son avenir.
Paris, Bureau de la Phalange, à la librairie Sociale, 1839.
8vo, pp. x, [2 (part-title, blank)], 212, with one lithographed plate after p. 194 (facsimile ALS from Fourier to Harel); a few very light oilstains; else a very good copy, partially uncut; bound in a sammelband with eight other works (see below) in contemporary polished tree sheep, flat spine gilt in compartments, plum morocco lettering-piece, pseudo-marbled endpapers; a few minor abrasions to sides; contemporary underlining and marking to c. 10 pp.
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Ménage sociétaire ou Moyen d’augmenter son bien-être en diminuant sa dépense, avec indication de quelques nouvelles combinaisons pour améliorer et assurer son avenir.
First edition of this work by the entrepreneur and inventor Charles Harel (1771–1852), a friend and disciple of Charles Fourier’s, describing Harel’s project for the founding of an utopian community of two hundred people housed in a single building, bound with eight other works in a sammelband on peace also including rare works on William Penn and William Wilberforce.
The Ménage sociétaire envisions a building which could house single people and widowers, as well as married people without children, aged thirty-five to seventy; Harel’s plan details location and structure (the building should be near the Étoile in Paris, to avoid congestion, and there should be both communal spaces and dwellings for families and individuals), practical advice (the influence of specific foods, magnetism, exercise), and rules (‘love’, ‘the library’, etc.). A plate containing a facsimile of an 1837 autograph letter from Fourier to Harel (‘Monsieur & ami’) is bound after p. 194.
A contemporary reader has marked numerous passages in our copy, namely Harel’s complaints about merchants’ deception regarding the nature and quality of their goods, a particular ‘obsession’ of his (see Iacub, p. 63), e.g. using molasses to colour broth, weakening brandy with water, and supplementing cocoa with starch and sugar in chocolate. It is for this reason, Harel argues, that the number of Parisians in hospitals and hospices is so high, as well as mortality rates, particularly amongst children who consume low-quality milk; in the Ménage, therefore, meals were eaten communally, with an emphasis on healthy foods.
The sammelband also comprises:
ii. GIROU DE BUZAREINGUES, Charles. De la nature des êtres, essai ontologique. Rodez, N. Ratery, 1840. Pp. 91, [5]. Light oilstaining to final (blank) verso, else an excellent, clean copy. First edition of these scientific remarks on space, void, the barometer, electricity and other phenomena of physics by a distinguished agronomist and physicist, the inventor of a micrometer. OCLC finds no copies outside continental Europe; not in Library Hub.
iii. [PEACE SOCIETY.] Société de la Paix fondée à Londres en 1816. [Paris, H. Fournier et Compagnie, s.a. (c. 1846)]. Pp. 4; browned. Scarce third edition (first 1844), a presentation of the Sociétés de la Paix founded at the end of the Napoleonic wars, first established in New York in 1815 and expanded to London in 1816, detailing the society’s history, branches, notable past prizes and events, and committee members and honorary members, including the social reformer Frédéric Gaëtan, Marquis de La Rochefoucauld-Liancourt (see item ix).
iv. [PACIFISM.] La Guerre est antichrétienne. [Paris, Claye, Taillefer et Compagnie, s.a. (c. 1850).] Pp. 4; a very good copy. First edition of this scarce pacifist pamphlet. Not on OCLC or Library Hub; CCfr records two copies only.
v. [PACIFISM.] L’Olivier ou Résumé historique des travaux des Sociétés de Paix jusqu’à la fin de l’année 1846. No 3. [Paris, s.n., s.a. (c. 1847).] Pp. 16; somewhat browned, sporadic light foxing. First edition of this rare pamphlet on the Peace Society, containing extracts of correspondence between women’s branches of the society in Philadelphia and in Exeter (signed by 1623 and 3525 members, respectively), petitions from the secretary of the London branch to Sir Robert Peel, and from the secretary of the American branch to President James K. Polk. OCLC finds copies at the BnF only.
vi. [NECKER, Jacques.] Réflexions sur la guerre ... extraites de son ouvrage sur “l’Administration des finances de la France”. [Paris, H. Fournier et Compagnie, s.a.] Pp. 19, [1 blank)]; first page lightly toned; else a very good, clean copy. Rare tiré-à-part, a pacifist pamphlet containing an extract from Necker’s Administration des Finances de la France, with a demonstration of the deadly economic consequences of war. OCLC finds one copy in the US (Yale), and none in the UK; not in Library Hub.
vii. [PENN, William.] Entrevue de Guillaume Penn et Charles II. (1681). [Paris, Claye, Taillefer et Ce, s.a. (c. 1840)]. Pp. 4; a very good copy. First edition of this imaginary dialogue featuring William Penn. Quakers played a pivotal role in the formation of the Sociétés de la Paix and in the establishment of the pacifist movement in the nineteenth century. OCLC finds two copies in the US (NYPL, Yale), and none in the UK; not in Library Hub.
viii. [PACIFISM.] Société de la morale Chrétienne. Comité de la paix. [Paris, A. Henry, s.a.] Pp. 20; slightly toned, light foxing to first page; else good. First edition, rare, of a report for the year 1843 of the first pacifist association in France, founded in 1821 as ‘Société de la Morale Chrétienne’.
ix. [WILBERFORCE, William.] [Frédéric Gaëtan], Marquis de LA ROCHEFOUCAULD-LIANCOURT. Notice historique sur la vie de Williams Wilberforce ... Paris, A. Henry, 1833. Pp. 23, [1 (blank)], with half-title; a very good copy, partially unopened. First edition of this note on William Wilberforce by the son of François Alexandre Frédéric de La Rochefoucauld, founder of the Société de la morale chrétienne.
See Iacub, Les architectures du bonheur. De Charles Fourier aux Grands Voisins (2019),
pp. 61–4.
