Lebègue

Autograph letter by Pierre-Joseph-Marie Proudhon, signed and dated 7 November 1862. 3 pages in black ink on a bifolium. Fold of the bifolium weakened, without affecting the text. Not included in the correspondence published by Lacroix in 1875.
Significant and likely unpublished letter from Proudhon to his publisher Alphonse Lebègue, whom he considers "the cause of liberty in France and independence in Belgium" in these lines. 

Proudhon underscores the importance of his ideological struggle for federalism in Europe, following the controversial publication of his pamphlet La Fédération et l’unité en Italie, and a few months before his political testament Du Principe fédératif. He fiercely criticizes his famous adversary Adolphe Thiers’ Histoire du Consulat et de l’Empire. Since his years in Brussels, Proudhon had intended to write a book debunking the Napoleonic myth as promoted in Thiers' work.

New edition.
Contemporary full tawny calf bindings, smooth spines richly decorated with gilt fillets and tools as well as black morocco title and library labels, boards framed with a cold fillet and gilt corner dots and stamped in their centers with the arms of the Duchess of Berry, pebbled paper endpapers and pastedowns, pastedowns surrounded by gilt dentelle, all edges marbled. Some minor rubbing without consequence, otherwise a handsome copy.
Handsome armorial copy that belonged to the library of the Château de Rosny where the duchess assembled no fewer than 8,000 titles.