Catalogue Entry: ALCH00088

Two sets of notes on La lumière sortant par soy même des tenebres.

Author: Isaac Newton

Metadata: Not yet dated, in English , c. 2,500 words, 5 pp. on 3 ff.

Source: Ms. 414, The Babson College Grace K. Babson Collection of the Works of Sir Isaac Newton, The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, California, USA

Custodial History

Bought at the Sotheby sale by C.A. Stonehill for £5. Stonehill offered it to Keynes for £10 on 7 September 1936, but Keynes obviously refused this 100% mark-up, and on 18 September Stonehill told Yahuda it was still available. On 15 December 1936 Stonehill reminded Yahuda that he had taken it on approval ten days ago for £7.10s. and asked if he wanted to keep it. A receipt among the Yahuda papers dated 31 December 1936 for £7.10s., in settlement of an account dated 4 December 1936, surely refers to this lot. How it came to the Babson is unclear. See Spargo, '1936 sale', 128. In 2006, following the closure of the Dibner Institute, the holdings of the Babson Collection were transferred on permanent loan to the Hungtington Library, San Marino, California.

Sotheby Lot

SL41

Contents

Ms. 414A (late 1690s or later): 'Ex Lumine de tenebris': 2 pp. of notes constituting Newton's abstracts of his own earlier abstracts (Yahuda Var. 1 Ms. 30 and Babson Ms. 414B).

Ms. 414B (c. 1687-92): the end of the series of abstracts from this work of which the beginning is now Yahuda Var. 1 Ms. 30, 3 pp.

Related Material

See H1003. Ms. 414B is transcribed together with Yahuda Var. 1 Ms. 30 as a single reunited text, with notes, in Dobbs, Janus Faces, 278-87.