Henry More

Verse

Cupid's Conflict (‘Thrice happy he whose name is wrote above’)

First published in Democritus Platonissans (Cambridge, 1646). Philosophical Poems (Cambridge, 1647), p. 306.

See PsK 115-118.

A Hymn on the Creation (‘When God the first Foundations laid’)

First published in More's Philosophical Poems (Cambridge, 1647).

MoH 1

Copy, headed ‘A Hymn on the creation: By Dr More: wth some Additions’ and beginning ‘When God ye ferst Foundations laid’, on two conjugate quarto leaves.

In: A folio composite volume of correspondence of the Rev. Richard Roach (fl.1697-1727), Fellow of St John's College, Oxford, and Rector of Hackney, in various hands, 408 leaves.

Bodleian, MS Rawl D. 833, ff. 135r-6r.

MoH 2

Copy, by Elizabeth Rowe, headed ‘A Hymn by Der Henry More’.

In: A quarto volume of autograph poems by Elizabeth Rowe (née Singer, 1674-1737), 306 pages, in contemporary vellum boards. Early 18th century.

A tipped-in letter by Thomas Stevenson, Cambridge bookseller, to J.A. Wickham, 2 August 1841, says this volume came to him with other books from the Rev. J.W. Berry, vicar of Foxton. A note inside the front cover by one ‘M. J.’ also records his purchase of ‘this Valuable book’ from ‘Mr Kerslake’.

Sotheby's, 21-22 July 1980, lot 552, with a facsimile of p. 82 in the sale catalogue.

Harvard, MS Eng 1341, pp. 288-9.

Prose

The Sure Guide

Unfinished and unpublished treatise, beginning ‘That short but weighty Prophecy of the Prophet Malachi, ch.4. v.2 “But unto you that fear my name...”’

MoH 3

Copy on 29 pages, rectos only, with a preliminary two pages of ‘The Contents of the ensuing Discourse. Chap 1st-3d’ by ‘C. B.’; headed ‘The Copy of a M.S. Treatise penn'd by that Great Man the truly Learned Dr.Henry More, which he left unfinish'd at his Death’, and subscribed ‘N.B. The foregoing Treatise is Part of what Dr. More intended to have intitul'ed, The sure Guide wherefore I can't but heartily Lament the unspeakable Loss which the world has sustain'd, by our Author's being prevented by Death from the farther Prosecution of this his great and charitable Designe C. B.’

In: An octavo volume principally of verse, in a single hand, unpaginated, in contemporary calf. Entitled ‘Poems on Several Occasions written By Sr Wm. Dawes Barnt. An: Dni. 1692do Ætat. suæ 20mo...Transcrib'd from the Original. by C. B.’: i.e. by Charles Blake, whose name, dated 1692, appears on the flyleaf. 1692.

Dobell's sale catalogue The Literature of the Restoration (1918), item 1241. Item 33 in an unidentified sale catalogue of ‘Autograph Letters and Manuscripts’.

Harvard, MS Eng 640, [unspecified page numbers].

Letters

Letter(s)

*MoH 4

A folio composite volume of some 150 autograph letters signed by Henry More, to Anne (née Finch), Lady Conway, as well as five by him to her husband, Edward, Lord Conway, and two to Mrs Elizabeth Foxcroft. 1650-79.

Edited, with related Conway letters from other sources, in Nicolson, with a facsimile of More's letter of 18 April [1653] after p. 80. Three of More's letters to Lady Anne, on ff. 302r-7v, which were omitted from Nicolson are edited and discussed in Alan Gabbey, ‘Anne Conway et Henry More: Lettres sur Descartes (1650-51)’, Archives de Philosophie, 40 (1977), 379-404.

British Library, Add. MS 23216.

*MoH 5

Five autograph letters signed by More, to Frances Finch (afterwards wife of Clifford Clifton), all undated but before 1650. c.1640s?

Recorded in HMC, 55, Various Collections, VII (1914), p. 428.

University of Nottingham, Cl C 330-334.

*MoH 6

Autograph letter signed, to Richard Baxter, from Hampton Court, 23 June [1662]. 1662.

Edited in Richard Baxter, Reliquiae Baxterianae, ed. Matthew Sylvester (London, 1696), Book I, part ii, pp. 382-3. Reprinted in White Kennett, A Register and Chronicle Ecclesiastical and Civil (London, 1728), p. 714. Bliss, pp. 242-3 (from Kennett). Printed text quoted in Darwin, pp. 192-3.

Dr Williams's Library, Baxter Letters, Vol. V, ff. 85r-6v.

MoH 7

Extracts from three letters by More, to Dr John Worthington, dated respectively 24 January and 7 February 1664/5 and 10 May 1665. 18th-century.

In: A small quarto volume of miscellaneous collections relating to Gresham College, compiled by John Ward, 168 leaves.

British Library, Add. MS 6193, ff. 34r-v.

MoH 8

Extracts from three letters by More, to Dr John Worthington, dated respectively 24 January and 7 February 1664/5 and 10 May 1665. 18th-century.

In: A composite volume of biographical collections made by or for Thomas Birch, in various hands, 283 leaves. Volume III (M-S) of Birch's biographical collections. c.1730-66.

British Library, Add. MS 4223, ff. 41r-2r.

*MoH 9

Autograph letter signed by More, to Dr John Pell, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 23 May 1665. 1665.

In: A folio composite volume of papers and correspondence of John Pell (1611-85), mathematician and political agent, in various hands.

Pell Papers (1st series), Volume II.

British Library, Add. MS 4279, f. 156r.

*MoH 10

Autograph letter signed by More, to Robert Boyle, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 5 June 1665. 1665.

Royal Society, London, B.L.4-77.

*MoH 11

Autograph letter signed by More, to Robert Boyle, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 27 November [1665]. 1665.

Edited in The Works of the Hon. Robert Boyle, VI (1772), 513. Edited from thence in Nicolson, p. 264.

Royal Society, London, B.L.4-79.

*MoH 12

Autograph letter signed by More, to Sir George Rawdon, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 6 May 1672. 1672.

Recorded in HMC, 78, Hastings II (1930), p. 379. Facsimile in The Huntingdon Papers (London, 1926), IV, Plate XX.

Huntington, HA 15371.

*MoH 13

Autograph letter signed by More, to Sir George Rawdon, 20 September 1673. 1673.

Huntington, HA 15372.

*MoH 14

Autograph letter signed by More, to Dr Simon Patrick, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 5 October 1673. 1673.

In: A folio composite volume of state letters and papers, in various hands, 225 leaves.

Bodleian, MS Tanner 42, ff. 38r-9v.

*MoH 15

Autograph letter signed by More, to William Penn, in the hand of an amanuensis with More's autograph marginal additions, signature and substantial postscript, on altogether sixteen folio pages, from Ragley, 22 May 1675. 1675.

Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Penn-Forbes Collection, Vol. II, p. 70.

*MoH 16

Autograph letter signed by More, to Sir George Rawdon, 5 September 1676. 1676.

Recorded in HMC, 78, Hastings II (1930), p. 385.

Huntington, HA 15373.

MoH 17

Autograph letter signed by More, to G. Clark, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 19 March 1678/9. 1679.

Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Gratz Collection, British Authors, Case 10, Box 33, [unnumbered item].

*MoH 18

Autograph letter signed by More, to William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 2 January 1679/80. 1680.

In: A folio composite volume of state letters and papers, 151 leaves.

Bodleian, MS Tanner 38, f. 115r.

*MoH 19

Autograph letter signed by More, to Dr John Sharp, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 16 August 1680. 1680.

In: A folio guardbook of letters and papers of Ralph Thoresby (1658-1725), Yorkshire antiquary and topographer, in various hands and paper sizes, 225 leaves. Volume III (M-S) of the Thoresby Papers.

Acquired by Thomas Birch in 1764.

British Library, Add. MS 4276, ff. 41r-2r.

*MoH 20

Autograph letter signed by More, to Richard Baxter, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 25 September 1681. 1681.

Dr Williams's Library, Baxter Letters, Vol. III, ff. 286r-7v.

*MoH 21

Autograph letter signed by More, to Richard Baxter, from Christ's College, Cambridge, 10 February 1681/2. 1682.

Facsimile in IELM, II.ii (1993), Facsimile IV, after p. xxi.

Dr Williams's Library, Baxter Letters, Vol. III, ff. 284r-5v.

*MoH 22

Letter, in the hand of an amanuensis and signed by More and other fellows of Christ's College, Cambridge, to Sir John Finch, [October 1682]. 1682.

Edited in HMC, 71, Finch II (1922), pp. 179-181.

Leicestershire Record Office, DG 7, Box 4985, Bundle XII.

*MoH 23

Autograph letter signed by More, to Sir George Rawdon, 18 October 1683. 1683.

Huntington, HA 15374.

Documents

Inscription(s)

MoH 24

Autograph supplicats signed by More, 1 April 1636, and again in 1637 and 1638. 1636-38.

In: Supplicats volume of the 1630s.

Cambridge University Archives, Supplicats, 1630s, [unspecified page numbers].

*MoH 25

An autograph inscription, in Greek and Latin, signed by More at Christ's College, Cambridge, on an oblong octavo leaf detached from the album, or liber amicorum, of one Johannus Gezeldus. 1671/2.

Saltykov-Shchedrin State Public Library, St Petersburg, Soukht, Box 40, [unnumbered item].

*MoH 26

An autograph signature of Henry More, cut from a document dated 1673. 1673.

In: A folio composite volume of miscellaneous letters and papers, 161 leaves.

Bodleian, MS Tanner 46, f. 138r.

Will

*MoH 27

Autograph last will and testament signed by More, 12 June 1686. 1686.

National Archives, Kew, PROB 10/1181.

MoH 28

A registered copy of More's last will and testament of 12 June 1686, proved 2 [or 22] October 1687. 1687.

Edited in Nicolson, pp. 481-3.

National Archives, Kew, PROB 11/388/127.

Miscellaneous Extracts from Works by More

Extracts

MoH 29

Some ‘Annotationes in Casp: Bartholimi Metaphysicam majorem’ entered as ‘Tutoris Mori Camb.’

In: A sextodecimo notebook of Latin tracts and miscellaneous memoranda, 48 leaves. Mid-late 17th century.

British Library, Sloane MS 235, f. 14r-v.

MoH 30

Extracts from, and notes on, Henry More's writings. 19th century.

Cambridge University Library, MS Add. 4876, ff. 667r-79v .

MoH 31

Extracts from ‘Dr Henry More's Philosophical Collections’.

In: A duodecimo notebook.

Cambridge University Library, MS Dd. 12. 32, pp. 61-97.

MoH 32

Extracts, headed ‘Principles Containing the true Grounds of Faith in matters of Religion, taken out of Dr. Moor's Dialogues of the Kingdom of God. Vol IId’, on 86 pages.

In: A quarto miscellany of verse and prose, in English, Latin and French, in several hands, written from both ends, 360 pages (the majority blank), in old calf. Inscribed (p. [41 rev.]) ‘J. Tyrell’ and compiled at least in part by James Tyrrell (1642-1718), historical writer and friend of the philosopher John Locke (1632-1704), a poem by whom (ff. [16v-17r]) he dockets as ‘By my dear Friend Mr J. Lock’. c.1670s-80s.

Later in the library of Richard Monckton Milnes (1809-85), first Baron Houghton, author and politician, and his son Robert Offley Ashburton Milnes, afterwards Crewe-Milnes (1858-1945), first Marquess of Crewe, politician.

Nicholas Fisher, London, [Tyrrell MS], [unnumbered pages].

MoH 33

Extracts, headed ‘Dr More's Immortality of ye Soule An: Do: 1675’.

In: An octavo commonplace book of prose extracts, many under subject headings, written from both ends on rectos only, in contemporary calf. Inscribed, evidently by the compiler, ‘Henry Harpur An: Do: 1674’. c.1675.

Yale, Osborn MS Hey 7, f. [ir-3r rev.].