Following is another in an occasional series of articles featuring significant new acquisitions of the Library or newly available collections:
The Library has acquired a rare copy of the prospectus to the Encyclop‚die m‚thodique, ou par ordre de matiŠres published in pamphlet form by Charles-Joseph Panckoucke in December 1781.
Caught in the encyclopedic frenzy of the time and inspired by Diderot's criticism of his own and d'Alembert's Encyclop‚die, ou Dictionnaire raisonn‚ des arts et des sciences (1751-1772), Panckoucke proposed to publish the ultimate encyclopedia. The M‚thodique would be a revised, enlarged and more scientific work than the Encyclop‚die and organized systematically by subject rather than by the long-popular, but less scientific, alphabetical ordering of entries.
The M‚thodique, organized as a series of subject dictionaries, would present subjects more comprehensively and cohesively than the Encyclop‚die had been able to do. The Encyclop‚die had relied on a controversial system of cross references to bring various aspects of a subject together, as well as to promote the philosophic view of the encyclop‚distes.
The 80-page prospectus of the M‚thodique includes criticisms of the Encyclop‚die, samples of text, a list of authors and a type specimen of the three-columns-per-page quarto edition, demonstrating the paper and type specially cast by the preeminent French typefounder, Pierre Simon Fournier. Panckoucke offered his enlarged and updated encyclopedia in two formats -- a quarto and an octavo edition -- at a moderate price fixed for the duration of the subscription. By offering smaller formats and a lower price, he hoped to make his M‚thodique more accessible to a far wider range of reading publics than Diderot's folio editions had been.
It is of special significance to the Library of Congress that Panckoucke achieved his aim of spreading the M‚thodique to wider and geographically different publics. During the years following the issuance of this prospectus, Panckoucke was able to sign up more than 4,000 subscribers. Among his clientele was Thomas Jefferson, having arrived in Paris in 1784 as Benjamin Franklin's successor as minister to the French court, subscribing not only for himself, but also for his friends in America.
There is also evidence of Jefferson's subscriptions for James Monroe, James Madison, Benjamin Franklin and others. By 1815 Jefferson had 136-1/2 volumes of the M‚thodique in his private library. This number is revealed in the catalog of his library that he sold to Congress after the British burned the Capitol in 1814. The Library of Congress was then housed in the Capitol. Jefferson's library formed the nucleus of the Library of Congress's collections and set the direction of the Library's collecting patterns for the future.
Not only was Thomas Jefferson enthusiastic about the appearance of the M‚thodique, but he also assisted in the writing of some of the articles. Jean-Nicolas Demeunier, who in 1786 was preparing the articles on the United States and various states, sent Jefferson a long list of questions about the history and character of the newly formed nation.
Jefferson found the article on Etats-Unis full of errors and misconceptions and sent back to Demeunier a very long letter containing corrections and suggestions, which Demeunier incorporated into his text. Demeunier's article on Virginia followed Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia fairly closely, and the author also reprinted Virginia's statute for religious freedom.
The M‚thodique began publication in 1782, during the last phase of Enlightenment publishing immediately preceding the French Revolution. By the time Panckoucke had published his 1781 prospectus, he was well aware that he was undertaking a huge project involving him in an enormous financial speculation. He had not, however, foreseen the dramatic changes in the political and economic environment that would affect the publication of his encyclopedia.
The M‚thodique survived the revolution and was completed in 1832, 50 years after Panckoucke launched the project. The prospectus, entirely untrimmed in original wrappers and in perfect preservation, adds to the Library's comprehensive collection of the world's encyclopedias, including its copy of Panckoucke's 217-volume encyclopedia. Its ties with Thomas Jefferson make it an all the more significant acquisition in 1993, the 250th anniversary of the birth of the nation's third president.
