After about a year’s preparation, the third edition was announced in 1787; the first number was published early in 1788, and the first volume in October 1788. There were to be 300 weekly numbers, price 1s. each, forming 30 parts at 10s. 6d. each, and 15 volumes, with 360 plates. It was completed in 1797 in 18 vols. 4to, containing 14,579 pages and 542 plates. Among the multifarious articles represented in the frontispiece, which was required by the traditional fashion of the period, is a balloon. The maps are, as in subsequent editions, distributed among the articles relating to the respective countries. It was edited by Colin Macfarquhar as far as the article “Mysteries” (by Dr Doig, vol. xii.), when he died, on the 2nd of April 1793, in his forty-eighth year, “worn out,” says Constable, “by fatigue and anxiety of mind.” His children’s trustees and Andrew Bell requested George Gleig of Stirling (consecrated on the 30th of October 1808 assistant and successor to the bishop of Brechin), who had written about twelve articles, to edit the rest of the work; “and for the time, and the limited sum allowed him for the reward of contributors, his part in the work was considered very well done” (Constable, ii. 312). Professor Robison was induced by Gleig to become a contributor. He first revised the article “Optics,” and then wrote a series of articles on natural philosophy, which attracted great attention and were long highly esteemed by scientific men. The sub-editors were James Walker (Primus Scotiae Episcopus 27th of May 1837, died on the 5th of March 1841, aged seventy) until 1795, then James Thomson, succeeded in November 1796 by his brother Thomas, afterwards professor of chemistry at Glasgow, who remained connected with the Encyclopaedia until 1800. According to Kerr (Smellie’s Life, i. 364-365), 10,000 copies were printed, and the profit to the proprietors was £42,000, besides the payments for their respective work in the conduct of the publication as tradesmen,—Bell as engraver of all the plates, and Macfarquhar as sole printer. According to Constable (Memoirs, ii. 312), the impression was begun at 5000 copies, and concluded with a sale of 13,000. James Hunter, “an active bookseller of no character,” who had a shop in Middle Row, Holborn, sold the book to the trade, and on his failure Thomson Bonar, a wine merchant, who had married Bell’s daughter, became the seller of the book. He quarrelled with his father-in-law, who would not see him for ten years before his death in 1809. When the edition was completed, the copyright and remaining books were sold in order to wind up the concern, and “the whole was purchased by Bell, who gave £13 a copy, sold all the complete copies to the trade, printed up the odd volumes, and thus kept the work in the market for several years” (Constable, ii. 312)
The supplement of the third edition, printed for Thomson Bonar, and edited by Gleig, was published in 1801 in 2 vols. 4to, containing 1624 pages and 50 copperplates engraved by D. Lizars. In the dedication to the king, dated Stirling, 10th December 1800, Dr Gleig says: “The French Encyclopédie had been accused, and justly accused, of having disseminated far and wide the seeds of anarchy and atheism. If the Encyclopaedia Britannica shall in any degree counteract the tendency of that pestiferous work, even these two volumes will not be wholly unworthy of your Majesty’s attention.” Professor Robison added 19 articles to the series he had begun when the third edition was so far advanced. Professor Playfair assisted in “Mathematics.” Dr Thomas Thomson wrote “Chemistry,” “Mineralogy” and other articles, in which the use of symbols was for the first time introduced into chemistry; and these articles formed the first outline of his System of Chemistry, published at Edinburgh in 1802, 8vo, 4 vols.; the sixth edition, 1821.
The fourth edition, printed for Andrew Bell, was begun in 1800 or 1801, and finished in 1810 in 20 vols. 4to, containing 16,033 pages, with 581 plates engraved by Bell. The dedication to the king, signed Andrew Bell, is dated Lauristoun, Edinburgh, 1809. The preface is that of the third edition with the necessary alterations and additions in the latter part. No articles were reprinted from the supplement, as Bell had not the copyright. Professor Wallace’s articles on mathematics were much valued, and raised the scientific character of the work. Dr Thomas Thomson declined the editorship, and recommended Dr James Millar, afterwards editor of the Encyclopaedia Edinensis (died on the 13th of July 1827). He was fond of natural history and a good chemist, but, according to Constable, slow and dilatory and not well qualified. Andrew Bell died on the 10th of June 1809, aged eighty-three, “leaving,” says Constable, “two sets of trustees, one literary to make the money, the other legal to lay it out after it was made.” The edition began with 1250 copies and concluded at 4000, of which two-thirds passed through the hands of Constable’s firm. Early in 1804 Andrew Bell had offered Constable and his partner Hunter the copyright of the work, printing materials, &c., and all that was then printed of the fourth edition, for £20,000. This offer was in agitation in March 1804, when the two partners were in London. On the 5th of May 1804, after Lord Jeffrey’s arrival in Edinburgh, as he relates to Francis Horner, they entrusted him with a design, on which he found that most of his friends had embarked with great eagerness, “for publishing an entire new encyclopaedia upon an improved plan. Stewart, I understand, is to lend his name, and to write the preliminary discourse, besides other articles. Playfair is to superintend the mathematical department, and Robison the natural philosophy. Thomas Thomson is extremely zealous in the cause. W. Scott has embraced it with great affection.... The authors are to be paid at least as well as reviewers, and are to retain the copyright of their articles for separate publication if they think proper” (Cockburn, Life of Lord Jeffrey, 1852, ii. 90). It was then, perhaps, that Constable gave £100 to Bonar for the copyright of the supplement.
The fifth edition was begun immediately after the fourth as a mere reprint. “The management of the edition, or rather mismanagement, went on under the lawyer trustees for several years, and at last the whole property was again brought to the market by public sale. There were about 1800 copies printed of the five first volumes, which formed one lot, the copyright formed another lot, and so on. The whole was purchased by myself and in my name for between £13,000 and £14,000, and it was said by the wise booksellers of Edinburgh and others that I had completely ruined myself and all connected with me by a purchase to such an enormous amount; this was early in 1812” (Constable, ii. 314). Bonar, who lived next door to the printing office, thought he could conduct the book, and had resolved on the purchase. Having a good deal of money, he seemed to Constable a formidable rival, whose alliance was to be secured. After “sundry interviews” it was agreed that Constable should buy the copyright in his own name, and that Bonar should have one-third, and also one-third of the copyright of the supplement, for which he gave £200. Dr James Millar corrected and revised the last 15 volumes. The preface is dated the 1st of December 1814. The printing was superintended by Bonar, who died on the 26th of July 1814. His trustees were repaid his advances on the work, about £6000, and the copyright was valued at £11,000, of which they received one-third, Constable adding £500, as the book had been so extremely successful. It was published in 20 vols., 16,017 pages, 582 plates, price £36, and dated 1817.
Soon after the purchase of the copyright, Constable began to prepare for the publication of a supplement, to be of four or, at the very utmost, five volumes. “The first article arranged for was one on ‘Chemistry’ by Sir Humphry Davy, but he went abroad [in October 1813] and I released him from his engagement, and employed Mr Brande; the second article was Mr Stewart’s Dissertation, for which I agreed to pay him £1000, leaving the extent of it to himself, but with this understanding, that it was not to be under ten sheets, and might extend to twenty” (Constable, ii. 318). Dugald Stewart, in a letter to Constable, the 15th of November 1812, though he declines to engage to execute any of his own suggestions, recommends that four discourses should “stand in front,” forming “a general map of the various departments of human knowledge,” similar to “the excellent discourse prefixed by D’Alembert to the French Encyclopédie,” together with historical sketches of the progress since Bacon’s time of modern discoveries in metaphysical, moral and political philosophy, in mathematics and physics, in chemistry, and in zoology, botany and mineralogy. He would only promise to undertake the general map and the first historical sketch, if his health and other engagements permitted, after the second volume of his Philosophy of the Human Mind (published in 1813) had gone to press. For the second he recommended Playfair, for chemistry Sir Humphry Davy. He received £1000 for the first part of his dissertation (166 pages), and £700 for the second (257 pages), the right of publication being limited to the Supplement and Encyclopaedia. Constable next contracted with Professor Playfair for a dissertation “to be equal in length or not to Mr Stewart’s, for £250; but a short time afterwards I felt that to pay one eminent individual £1000 because he would not take less would be quite unfair, and I wrote to the worthy Professor that I had fixed his payment at £500.” Constable gave him £500 for the first part (127 pages), and would have given as much for the second (90 pages) if it had been as long. His next object was to find out the greatest defects in the book, and he gave Professor Leslie £200 and Graham Dalyell £100 for looking over it. He then wrote out a prospectus and submitted it in print to Stewart, “but the cautious philosopher referred” him to Playfair, who “returned it next day very greatly improved.” For this Constable sent him six dozen of very fine old sherry, only feeling regret that he had nothing better to offer. He at first intended to have two editors, “one for the strictly literary and the other for the scientific department.” He applied to Dr Thomas Brown, who “preferred writing trash of poetry to useful and lucrative employment.” At last he fixed on Mr Macvey Napier (born 1777), whom he had known from 1798, and who “had been a hard student, and at college laid a good foundation for his future career, though more perhaps in general information than in what would be, strictly speaking, called scholarship; this, however, does not fit him the less for his present task.” Constable, in a letter dated the 11th of June 1813, offered him £300 before the first part went to press, £150 on the completion at press of each of the eight half volumes, £500 if the work was reprinted or extended beyond 7000 copies and £200 for incidental expenses. “In this way the composition of the four volumes, including the introductory dissertations, will amount to considerably more than £9000.” In a postscript the certain payment is characteristically increased to £1575, the contingent to £735, and the allowance for incidental expenses to £300 (Constable, ii. 326). Napier went to London, and obtained the co-operation of many literary men. The supplement was published in half-volume parts from December 1816 to April 1824. It formed six volumes 4to, containing 4933 pages, 125 plates, 9 maps, three dissertations and 669 articles, of which a list is given at the end. The first dissertation, on the “progress of metaphysical, ethical and political philosophy,” was by Stewart, who completed his plan only in respect to metaphysics. He had thought it would be easy to adapt the intellectual map or general survey of human knowledge, sketched by Bacon and improved by D’Alembert, to the advanced state of the sciences, while its unrivalled authority would have softened criticism. But on closer examination he found the logical views on which this systematic arrangement was based essentially erroneous; and, doubting whether the time had come for a successful repetition of this bold experiment, he forebore to substitute a new scheme of his own. Sir James Mackintosh characterized this discourse as “the most splendid of Mr. Stewart’s works, a composition which no other living writer of English prose has equalled” (Edinburgh Review, xxvii. 191, September 1816). The second dissertation, “On the progress of mathematics and physics,” was by Playfair, who died 19th July 1819, when he had only finished the period of Newton and Leibnitz. The third, by Professor Brande, “On the progress of chemistry from the early middle ages to 1800,” was the only one completed. These historical dissertations were admirable and delightful compositions, and important and interesting additions to the Encyclopaedia; but it is difficult to see why they should form a separate department distinct from the general alphabet. The preface, dated March 1824, begins with an account of the more important previous encyclopaedias, relates the history of this to the sixth edition, describes the preparation for the supplement and gives an “outline of the contents,” and mentions under each great division of knowledge the principal articles and their authors’ names, often with remarks on the characters of both. Among the distinguished contributors were Leslie, Playfair, Ivory, Sir John Barrow, Tredgold, Jeffrey, John Bird Sumner, Blanco White, Hamilton Smith and Hazlitt. Sir Walter Scott, to gratify his generous friend Constable, laid aside Waverley, which he was completing for publication, and in April and May 1814 wrote “Chivalry.” He also wrote “Drama” in November 1818, and “Romance” in the summer of 1823. As it seemed to the editor that encyclopaedias had previously attended little to political philosophy, he wrote “Balance of Power,” and procured from James Mill “Banks for Savings,” “Education,” “Law of Nations,” “Liberty of the Press,” and other articles, which, reprinted cheaply, had a wide circulation. M’Culloch wrote “Corn Laws,” “Interest,” “Money,” “Political Economy,” &c. Mr Ricardo wrote “Commerce” and “Funding System,” and Professor Malthus, in his article “Population,” gave a comprehensive summary of the facts and reasonings on which his theory rested. In the article “Egypt” Dr Thomas Young “first gave to the public an extended view of the results of his successful interpretation of the hieroglyphic characters on the stone of Rosetta,” with a vocabulary of 221 words in English, Coptic, Hieroglyphic and Enchorial, engraved on four plates. There were about 160 biographies, chiefly of persons who had died within the preceding 30 years. Constable “wished short biographical notices of the first founders of this great work, but they were, in the opinion of my editor, too insignificant to entitle them to the rank which such separate notice, it was supposed, would have given them as literary men, although his own consequence in the world had its origin in their exertions” (Memoirs, ii. 326). It is to be regretted that this wish was not carried out, as was done in the latter volumes of Zedler. Arago wrote “Double Refraction” and “Polarization of Light,” a note to which mentions his name as author. Playfair wrote “Aepinus,” and “Physical Astronomy.” Biot wrote “Electricity” and “Pendulum.” He “gave his assistance with alacrity,” though his articles had to be translated. Signatures, on the plan of the Encyclopédie, were annexed to each article, the list forming a triple alphabet, A to XXX, with the full names of the 72 contributors arranged apparently in the order of their first occurrence. At the end of vol. vi. are Addenda and Corrigenda, including “Interpolation,” by Leslie, and “Polarization of Light,” by Arago.
The sixth edition, “revised, corrected and improved,” appeared in half-volume parts, price 16s. in boards, vol. xx. part ii. completing the work in May 1823. Constable, thinking it not wise to reprint so large a book year after year without correction, in 1820 selected Mr Charles Maclaren (1782-1866), as editor. “His attention was chiefly directed to the historical and geographical articles. He was to keep the press going, and have the whole completed in three years.” He wrote “America,” “Greece,” “Troy,” &c. Many of the large articles as “Agriculture,” “Chemistry,” “Conchology,” were new or nearly so; and references were given to the supplement. A new edition in 25 vols. was contemplated, not to be announced till a certain time after the supplement was finished; but Constable’s house stopped payment on the 19th of January 1826, and his copyrights were sold by auction. Those of the Encyclopaedia were bought by contract, on the 16th of July 1828, for £6150, by Thomas Allan, proprietor of the Caledonian Mercury, Adam Black, Abram Thomson, bookbinder, and Alexander Wight, banker, who, with the trustee of Constable’s estate, had previously begun the seventh edition. Not many years later Mr Black purchased all the shares and became sole proprietor.
The seventh edition, 21 vols. 4to (with an index of 187 pages, compiled by Robert Cox), containing 17,101 pages and 506 plates, edited by Macvey Napier, assisted by James Browne, LL.D., was begun in 1827, and published from March 1830 to January 1842. It was reset throughout and stereotyped. Mathematical diagrams were printed in the text from woodcuts. The first half of the preface was nearly that of the supplement. The list of signatures, containing 167 names, consists of four alphabets with additions, and differs altogether from that in the supplement: many names are omitted, the order is changed and 103 are added. A list follows of over 300 articles, without signatures, by 87 writers. The dissertations—1st, Stewart’s, 289 pages; 2nd, “Ethics” (136 pages), by Sir James Mackintosh, whose death prevented the addition of “Political Philosophy”; 3rd, Playfair’s, 139 pages; 4th, its continuation by Sir John Leslie, 100 pages—and their index of 30 pages, fill vol. i. As they did not include Greek philosophy, “Aristotle,” “Plato” and “Socrates” were supplied by Dr Hampden, afterwards bishop of Hereford. Among the numerous contributors of eminence, mention may be made of Sir David Brewster, Prof. Phillips, Prof. Spalding, John Hill Burton, Thomas De Quincey, Patrick Fraser Tytler, Capt. Basil Hall, Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, Antonio Panizzi, John Scott Russell and Robert Stephenson. Zoology was divided into 11 chief articles, “Mammalia,” “Ornithology,” “Reptilia,” “Ichthyology,” “Mollusca,” “Crustacea,” “Arachnides,” “Entomology,” “Helminthology,” “Zoophytes,” and “Animalcule”—all by James Wilson.
The eighth edition, 1853-1860, 4to, 21 vols. (and index of 239 pages, 1861), containing 17,957 pages and 402 plates, with many woodcuts, was edited by Dr Thomas Stewart Traill, professor of medical jurisprudence in Edinburgh University. The dissertations were reprinted, with one on the “Rise, Progress and Corruptions of Christianity” (97 pages), by Archbishop Whately, and a continuation of Leslie’s to 1850, by Professor James David Forbes, 198 pages, the work of nearly three years, called by himself his “magnum opus” (Life, pp. 361, 366). Lord Macaulay, Charles Kingsley, Isaac Taylor, Hepworth Dixon, Robert Chambers, Rev. Charles Merivale, Rev. F.W. Farrar, Sir John Richardson, Dr Scoresby, Dr Hooker, Henry Austin Layard, Edw. B. Eastwick, John Crawfurd, Augustus Petermann, Baron Bunsen, Sir John Herschel, Dr Lankester, Professors Owen, Rankine, William Thomson, Aytoun, Blackie, Daniel Wilson and Jukes, were some of the many eminent new contributors found among the 344 authors, of whom an alphabetical list is given, with a key to the signatures. In the preface a list of 279 articles by 189 writers, classed under 15 heads, is given. This edition was not wholly reset like the seventh, but many long articles were retained almost or entirely intact.
The publication of the ninth edition (A. & C. Black) was commenced in January 1875, under the editorship of Thomas Spencer Baynes until 1880, and subsequently of W. Robertson Smith, and completed in 1889, 24 vols., with index. This great edition retained a certain amount of the valuable material in the eighth, but was substantially a new work; and it was universally acknowledged to stand in the forefront of the scholarship of its time. Its contributors included the most distinguished men of letters and of science. In 1898 a reprint, sold at about half the original price, and on the plan of payment by instalments, was issued by The Times of London; and in 1902, under the joint editorship of Sir Donald Mackenzie Wallace, President Arthur T. Hadley of Yale University, and Hugh Chisholm, eleven supplementary volumes were published, forming, with the 24 vols. of the ninth edition, a tenth edition of 35 volumes. These included a volume of maps, and an elaborate index (vol. 35) to the whole edition, comprising some 600,000 entries. In May 1903 a start was made with the preparation of the 11th edition, under the general editorship of Hugh Chisholm, with W. Alison Phillips as chief assistant-editor, and a staff of editorial assistants, the whole work of organization being conducted up to December 1909 from The Times office. Arrangements were then made by which the copyright and control of the Encyclopaedia Britannica passed to Cambridge University, for the publication at the University Press in 1910-1911 of the 29 volumes (one being Index) of the 11th edition, a distinctive feature of this issue being the appearance of the whole series of volumes practically at the same time.
A new and enlarged edition of the Encyclopédie arranged as a system of separate dictionaries, and entitled Encyclopédie méthodique ou par ordre de matières, was undertaken by Charles Joseph Panckoucke, a publisher of Paris (born at Lille on the 26th of November 1736, died on the 19th of December 1798). His privilege was dated the 20th of June 1780. The articles belonging to different subjects would readily form distinct dictionaries, although, having been constructed for an alphabetical plan, they seemed unsuited for any system wholly methodical. Two copies of the book and its supplement were cut up into articles, which were sorted into subjects. The division adopted was: 1, mathematics; 2 physics; 3, medicine; 4, anatomy and physiology; 5, surgery; 6, chemistry, metallurgy and pharmacy; 7, agriculture; 8, natural history of animals, in six parts; 9, botany; 10, minerals; 11, physical geography; 12, ancient and modern geography; 13, antiquities; 14, history; 15, theology; 16, philosophy; 17, metaphysics, logic and morality; 18, grammar and literature; 19, law; 20, finance; 21, political economy; 22, commerce; 23, marine; 24, art militaire; 25, beaux arts; 26, arts et métiers—all forming distinct dictionaries entrusted to different editors. The first object of each editor was to exclude all articles belonging to other subjects, and to take care that those of a doubtful nature should not be omitted by all. In some words (such as air, which belonged equally to chemistry, physics and medicine) the methodical arrangement has the unexpected effect of breaking up the single article into several widely separated. Each dictionary was to have an introduction and a classified table of the principal articles. History and its minor parts, as inscriptions, fables, medals, were to be included. Theology, which was neither complete, exact nor orthodox, was to be by the abbé Bergier, confessor to Monsieur. The whole work was to be completed and connected together by a Vocabulaire Universel, 1 vol. 4to, with references to all the places where each word occurred, and a very exact history of the Encyclopédie and its editions by Panckoucke. The prospectus, issued early in 1782, proposed three editions—84 vols. 8vo, 43 vols. 4to with 3 columns to a page, and 53 vols. 4to of about 100 sheets with 2 columns to a page, each edition having 7 vols. 4to of 250 to 300 plates each. The subscription was to be 672 livres from the 15th of March to July 1782, then 751, and 888 after April 1783. It was to be issued in livraisons of 2 vols. each, the first (jurisprudence, vol. i., literature, vol. i.) to appear in July 1782, and the whole to be finished in 1787. The number of subscribers, 4072, was so great that the subscription list of 672 livres was closed on the 30th of April. Twenty-five printing offices were employed, and in November 1782 the 1st livraison (jurisprudence, vol. i., and half vol. each of arts et métiers and histoire naturelle) was issued. A Spanish prospectus was sent out, and obtained 330 Spanish subscribers, with the inquisitor-general at their head. The complaints of the subscribers and his own heavy advances, over 150,000 livres, induced Panckoucke, in November 1788, to appeal to the authors to finish the work. Those en retard made new contracts, giving their word of honour to put their parts to press in 1788, and to continue them without interruption, so that Panckoucke hoped to finish the whole, including the vocabulary (4 or 5 vols.), in 1792. Whole sciences, as architecture, engineering, hunting, police, games, &c., had been overlooked in the prospectus; a new division was made in 44 parts, to contain 51 dictionaries and about 124 vols. Permission was obtained on the 27th of February 1789, to receive subscriptions for the separate dictionaries. Two thousand subscribers were lost by the Revolution. The 50th livraison appeared on the 23rd of July 1792, when all the dictionaries eventually published had been begun except seven—jeux familiers and mathématiques, physics, art oratoire, physical geography, chasses and pêches; and 18 were finished,—mathematics, games, surgery, ancient and modern geography, history, theology, logic, grammar, jurisprudence, finance, political economy, commerce, marine, arts militaires, arts académiques, arts et métiers, encyclopediana. Supplements were added to military art in 1797, and to history in 1807, but not to any of the other 16, though required for most long before 1832. The publication was continued by Henri Agasse, Panckoucke’s son-in-law, from 1794 to 1813, and then by Mme Agasse, his widow, to 1832, when it was completed in 102 livraisons or 337 parts, forming 166½ vols. of text, and 51 parts containing 6439 plates. The letterpress issued with the plates amounts to 5458 pages, making with the text 124,210 pages. To save expense the plates belonging to architecture were not published. Pharmacy (separated from chemistry), minerals, education, ponts et chaussées had been announced but were not published, neither was the Vocabulaire Universel, the key and index to the whole work, so that it is difficult to carry out any research or to find all the articles on any subject. The original parts have been so often subdivided, and have been so added to by other dictionaries, supplements and appendices, that, without going into great detail, an exact account cannot be given of the work, which contains 88 alphabets, with 83 indexes, and 166 introductions, discourses, prefaces, &c. Many dictionaries have a classed index of articles; that of économie politique is very excellent, giving the contents of each article, so that any passage can be found easily. The largest dictionaries are medicine, 13 vols., 10,330 pages; zoology, 7 dictionaries, 13,645 pages, 1206 plates; botany, 12,002 pages, 1000 plates (34 only of cryptogamic plants); geography, 3 dictionaries and 2 atlases, 9090 pages, 193 maps and plates; jurisprudence (with police and municipalities), 10 vols., 7607 pages. Anatomy, 4 vols., 2866 pages, is not a dictionary but a series of systematic treatises. Assemblée Nationale was to be in three parts,—(1) the history of the Revolution, (2) debates, and (3) laws and decrees. Only vol. ii., debates, appeared, 1792, 804 pages, Absens to Aurillac. Ten volumes of a Spanish translation with a vol. of plates were published at Madrid to 1806—viz. historia natural, i. ii.; grammatica, i.; arte militar, i., ii.; geografia, i.-iii.; fabricas, i., ii., plates, vol. i. A French edition was printed at Padua, with the plates, says Peignot, very carefully engraved. Probably no more unmanageable body of dictionaries has ever been published except Migne’s Encyclopédie théologique, Paris, 1844-1875, 4to, 168 vols., 101 dictionaries, 119,059 pages.