[ANTIQUARIAN BIBLIOGRAPHY / MANUSCRIPT]. "Discours bibliographique et litteraire sur l'arrangement d'une bibliotheque et d'un catalogue

S.l. (France), 1845. Good. MANUSCRIPT ON PAPER. Folio (300 x 203 mm), 23 pp. on 12 ff., written in brown ink (paper stock weak and somewhat browned, edges frayed, some staining and small tears to extremities). UNPUBLISHED MANUSCRIPT, THE SUBJECTS OF WHICH ARE ALMOST TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, BEING A "BIBLIOGRAPHICAL AND LITERARY DISCOURSE" ON ARRANGING AND CATALOGUING BOOKS, BEARING WITNESS TO AN ALMOST RELIGIOUS ZEAL FOR BIBLIOGRAPHY AND BIBLIOPHILY.

Drawing inspiration from Brunet ("Manuel du libraire") and his predecessors (the Jesuits in particular), our polymathematic author Suremain de Missery advocated a classification of works by subject, proposing a system of five main categories or "faculties," themselves subdivided into subcategories. To the general "faculty" of Sciences and Arts were added Theology, Jurisprudence, Belles lettres and History. Suremain de Missery also suggested adding categories for Dictionaries and Polygraphy (works belonging "either to several faculties or to several main divisions of a faculty"). Within each category, books on a more general subject were placed before books on a more specific subject; two books with the same subject were placed in chronological order of publication. Suremain de Missery seems to have created an additional classification system with a series of "synoptic tables" not reproduced here.

The author goes on to recommend the creation of several complementary catalogs: the "fictitious and rational" catalog, established according to the aforementioned principles, is supplemented by a "real and obligatory" catalog reflecting the physical organization of the books in the library, where works are grouped by format before being grouped by faculty. A table allows for establishing the correspondences between these two catalogs, to which, de Missery adds, one could also add an alphabetical catalog by title and another by author.

Perceiving in the methodical organization of his library a reflection of divine order, the author is unstinting in his praise of the science of bibliology and the art of cataloging, writing: "If this subject has great difficulties, which cannot be properly understood until they have been tackled, it also offers powerful attractions that abundantly reward the effort; nothing is as beautiful as order; and, although for more than half a century I have become familiar with all my books [...] I had never, however, fully grasped the harmony that can result from the arrangement of them as a whole, as I do now, seeing them arranged in this methodical order that enhances them and, in their rich diversity, presents an even richer unity. [...] By going back to the origin of our knowledge, I first found God: by considering here a few ideas about the arrangement of books, I find Him again: He is everywhere, like infinity."

The 8-word subtitle of this remarkable work seems to celebrate the classification and arrangement of books on libraries and their symbiotic relationship with the advancement of knowledge: "Unite dans la variete et variete dans l'unite." We have been unable to locate another instance of this "motto" in regard to bibliography or any other science. Indeed, it may appear here for the first and only time.

Antoine Benigne Suremain de Missery (Dijon: 1767 - Beaune: 1852) resigned from the Royal Artillery Corps in 1791 to devote himself to science. A student of Gaspard Monge, he published extensively, not only on bibliography (as here) but algebra, acoustics, music theory, theology, and even the game of solitaire.

The text of the present "Discours," previously unknown, was delivered in 1845 in the form of a speech before a learned society, almost certainly the Dijon Academie to which the author belonged for 58 years (!)

HIGHLY CURIOUS MANUSCRIPT THAT WARRANTS FURTHER RESEARCH.