The works of the learned Joseph Bingham ... Containing I. Origines Ecclesiasticae: or, The antiquities of the Christian Church. In twenty three books. II. A scholastical history of lay-baptism. In two parts. III. The French churches apology for the Church of England. IV. A discourse concerning the mercy of God to penitent sinners. In two volumes

London: Robert Knaplock, 1726. First collected edition, 2 vols., folio, pp. [4], xxxi, [1], 831, [11] index; [16], 842, [2] ads; first title-p. printed in red and black, sectional titles, 2 engraved plates and 10 engraved maps by Herman Moll; contemporary full paneled calf, effectively rebacked, rehinged with cloth tape, black morocco labels on spines; good and sound. Bingham (1668-1723), author of the Origines Ecclesiasticae, or The Antiquities of the Christian Church, "was the first, says a German writer, ëthat published a complete archÊology [of the Christian Church] and one worthy of the name.í And, we may add, he will probably be the last. What he (truncated) did he did so thoroughly and exhaustively, that he would be a bold man who should attempt again to go over ground so completely traversed ... The ëAntiquitiesí is, of course, the one imperishable monument which Bingham has raised for himself; but his lesser works, though now forgotten, are written in the same exhaustive fashion. The largest of these is entitled ëThe French Church's Apology for the Church of England,í which ëcontains a modest vindication of the doctrine, worship, government, and discipline of our church from the chief objections of dissenters, and returns answer to them upon the principles of the reformed church of Franceí . ... Bingham's literary industry must have been enormous; the ëAntiquitiesí alone is sufficient to prove this. The work bears on the face of it traces of many years' reading, before the writing began at all, and the labour must have been all the more severe because he was sadly cramped for books in spite of his proximity to Bishop Morley's library. His family preserved a copy of Pearson ëOn the Creed,í in which were eight pages neatly transcribed in his own hand, because he could not afford the few shillings requisite to purchase a new copy in the place of his own mutilated one. But never was literary industry less thrown away. Bingham has not only written an invaluable work, but he has secured for the English church the glory of supplying a serious deficiency in ecclesiastical literature. Even Romanists have been forced to confess that the ëAntiquitiesí is a most important addition to theological libraries, and the fact that it was translated into Latin by a German protestant (Professor Grischovius or Grischow) shows how highly it was appreciated by the reformed churches abroad" (DNB). (Inventory #: 27987)