David, Joannes [Jan] (1546-1613) Duodecim Specula Deum

David, Joannes [Jan] (1546-1613)

Duodecim Specula Deum Aliquando Videre Desideranti Concinnata. Antwerp: ex officina Plantiniana, apud Ioannem Moretum, 1610.First edition, octavo, [pi]1, *8, A-M8, N4, (last leaf blank but for printer's device present), illustrated with engraved title (mounted), full-page engraving of the Madonna and child by Philibert Bouttats (1650-1722) twelve full page emblematical engravings by Theodore Galle (1571-1633); bound in full contemporary parchment-covered boards, 7 1/4 x 4 1/2 in.Hollstein 7: Galle 113-124; Landwehr, Low Countries 134; Praz, 313."The Duodecim Specula consists of twelve chapters, each prefaced by an imago, focusing on various kinds and degrees of specular image: it starts with the Everyday Mirror (speculum commune), manufactured by "human artifice" (artis opus), the surface of which philosophers use to expose human characteristics, and ends with the Mirror of Beatific Vision (speculum visionis beatificae), in whose images the 'cutting edge of the mind' (acies mentis) glimpses the radiance of divinity." (Melion, Walter, and Enenkel, Karl A. E.,The Authority of the Word: Reflecting on Image and Text in Northern Europe, 1400-1700. Netherlands, Brill, 2011.)