The second part of the Pilgrim's Progress appeared in 1684. It depends more upon reflected than intrinsic merit; but copies of the first edition are even rarer than those of the first edition of the first part.
Octavo.
Collation: A-Q3, in eights. Portrait.
JOHN DRYDEN
(1631-1700)
35. Absalom | And | Achitophel. | A | Poem. | ... Si Propiùs ſtes | Te Capiet Magis.... | London, | Printed for J. T. and are to be Sold by W. Davis in | Amen-Corner, 1681.
The Earl of Shaftesbury, here typified as Achitophel for his share in the conspiracy to place the young Duke of Monmouth, Absalom, on the throne, was committed to the Tower in July, 1681; and this satire appeared in November, just before the Grand Jury acquitted him. Notwithstanding the lateness of the work, its success was unprecedented. We are told that Samuel Johnson's father, a bookseller of Litchfield, said that he could not remember a sale of equal rapidity, except that of the reports of the Sacheverell trial.
The author's name does not appear in the book; nor yet in the second edition, to which Tonson added two unsigned poems "To the unknown author."