A Quick Stab at the Eighteenth Century
An Online Exhibition Hosted by the University of Otago (link)

This Online Exhibition provides a brief overview of a rich century. The exhibition focuses on key aspects such as philosophy, religion, music, literature and science, and features notable works such as John Locke's Two Treatises on Government (1694), David Hume's Essays, Moral and Political (1748), a scarce printing of Thomas Paine's Age of Reason (1794), Mary Wollstonecraft's feminist classic A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1796), Sarah Fielding's David Simple (1744), periodicals such as The Tatler (1709) and The Gentleman's Magazine (1731), Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776), Samuel Johnson's Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland (1775), and a rare limited edition copy of Thomas Gray's Poems illustrated by William Blake (1972). A vast majority of the book and manuscripts are from Dr Esmond de Beer's Collection.

The exhibition coincides with the David Nichols Smith Seminar theme of 'Rewriting the Long Eighteenth Century' at the University of Otago on 10 to 14 April, and two other eighteenth century events: 'Evoking the 18th Century: Works from the Dunedin Public Art Gallery Collection', 17 March -28 September 2007; and 'Scottish Leaves: Books and Manuscripts from Scottish Writers 1711-1822', Dunedin Public Library Special Collections 10 April-15 July 2007.