Discurso politico da excellencia, aborrecimento, perseguição, & zelo da verdade. Em que tambem se trata das causas, & razões porque Deos castigou este Reino, & da misericordiosa lembrança que delle tevem na justa restituição del Rey nosso Senhor D. Ioham o IV, o Desejado, Libertador da Patria, Felice, Pio, sempre Augusto Monarcha da Lusitania. Dedicado ao Doctor Joham Pinto Ribeiro, fidalgo de sua casa, do seu Conselho, seu Desembargador do Paço, Guardamor do Archivo real da Torre do Tombo, & meritissimo cultor das boas artes.

Lisbon, Por João Rodriguez, Impressor, Na Officina de Lourenço de Anveres, 1647.. FIRST and ONLY EDITION. 4°, contemporary limp vellum (some cockling; ties gone), manuscript vertical short-title on spine. Woodcut initials. Woodcut tailpiece on p. 324. Woodcut headpieces. Occasional very minor, faint dampstains. Small repair to outer edge of front free endleaf. Overall in very good to fine condition. Old ink inscription, scored, above imprint on title page, with somewhat later, but still rather old ink signature in lower margin. Old ink inscription near top of front free endleaf recto. Some old ink marginalia and annotations to text in the form of corrections and word changes. (8 ll.), 641 [i.e. 639] pp. Pagination skips from 624 to 627, but text follows, and collation by signatures is correct. Page 210 incorrectly numbered 216. *** FIRST (and only?) EDITION of a most interesting example of Portuguese political thought during the epoch of the Restauração. In addition to political and judicial theory, the book provides some historical background to the Restauração, including events to which the author appears to have been an eyewitness, such as the entry of D. João, the Duke of Bragança into Évora in 1640, and his acclamation as king there. The dedicatee, João Pinto Ribeiro, a political theorist in his own right, was one of the prime movers in the 1640 revolt that raised the Duke of Bragança to the throne as D. João IV. After the main body of text, on pp. 623–31 appears an ode to D. João IV by the author. On pp. 633–6 are four sonnets addressed to D. Theodosio, Duque de Bragança, father of the future D. João IV, on the occasion of the visit to Lisbon in 1619 of D. Felipe III of Spain (II of Portugal). Perhaps this evocation of the warm reception then given by the Portuguese nobility to the Spanish monarch is the reason the book is today encountered in so few copies. On p. 637 is a sonnet "A milagrosa restauração deste reino".The author had a degree in civil law from Coimbra University, and served as Juiz de fóra in the villa of Monte-mór-o-novo. He was a native of Évora, where he died in 1651.There is some confusion as to whether or not there is another edition of the same year. The imprint states that the book was printed by João Rodrigues in the "Officina" of Lourenço de Anveres. Some catalogues give the imprint as that of João Rodrigues, others Lourenço de Anveres, yet others provide the full imprint with both names. We think that there is but a single edition.*** Barbosa Machado II, 499. Innocêncio III, 265–6. Pinto de Mattos (1970) p. 314: "É livro estimado e pouco vulgar". Martinho da Fonseca, Restauração 349. Biblioteca Nacional, Exposição bibliográfica da Restauração 571. Visconde da Trindade, Restauração 242 "Muito raro." Gubian 347. Moreira Cabral 3675. Azevedo Samodães 1323. Not in Goldsmith, Short Title Catalogue of Spanish and Portuguese Books 1601-1700 in the Library of the British Museum. Not in HSA. Not in Palha. Porbase cites a total of four copies, several of which are described as "perfuradas" and in "mau estado": two in the Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, a copy which had belonged to the Visconde de Trindade at the Biblioteca Geral da Universidade de Coimbra, as well as a copy at the Biblioteca João Paulo II-Universidade Católica Portuguesa. Not located in Jisc. Not located in Hollis. Not located in Orbis. KVK (searched 51 catalogues, including the BL), cites only the copy in the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and those noted by Porbase.