The Government of the Common-wealth of England, Scotland, & Ireland, And the Dominion thereto belonging [continued below]

[title continued] "As it was publickly declared at Westminster the 16. day of December 1653 . . . OLIVER LORD PROTECTOR of the said Common-wealth, took a Solemn Oath for observing the same." Wing (CD-ROM, 1996), G1456F ; Thomason, E.1063[5] Signatures: E2 F-L² chi¹. Issued separately and possibly also as part of a through-paged set. The last leaf bears "The oath taken by His Highness Oliver Cromwel, Lord Protector" signed (printed): O. Cromwell. Pp.[2] 21-46, modern rebinding, marbled boards, title on spine in red and gold, quarter leather, tract marked and stained throughout, mainly title, but text clear and complete. The number "26" has been scrawled on the title. Many institutions in UK and USA have copies but I have found no auction or catalogue reference, suggesting great scarcity. This view is supported by the instigator (Robert Amadeus, Baron Heath) of a facsimile edition for the Philobiblon Society ("Reprinted in fac-simile for Private Circulation 16th May 1867" in an unknown number of copies). In an autograph letter enclosed in my copy he says "I possess what I believe to be the only copy of the original"!. Note: The importance of the text is indicated by its appearance in "The Making of the Modern World: The Goldsmiths'-Kress Library of Economic Literature 1450-1850". Locke uses the title phrase in his "Second Treatise" (e.g. "Whoever therefore, from thenceforth, by inheritance, purchase, permission, or otherways, enjoys any part of the land, so annexed to, and under the government of that common-wealth, must take it with the condition it is under; that is, of submitting to the government of the common-wealth, under whose jurisdiction it is, as far forth as any subject of it.") And Hobbes's "Leviathan".