A Note on Mill Bibliography
- A Note on Mill Bibliography
John M. Robson
Associate Professor of English, Victoria College, University of Toronto; associate editor of Collected Works of John Stuart Mill (1963–)
NOTES
1. This edition, which has benefited Mill scholarship in so many ways, contains some errors in transcription and identification. A re-edited version of the MS is planned as part of the current Collected Works of John Stuart Mill (University of Toronto Press).
2. The copy is Vol. XXXVI in the Mill-Taylor Collection. Mr. C. G. Allen, for some years in charge of the Collection, in noting that the cataloguing was not complete when Professor MacMinn’s edition appeared, identifies the copyists’ hands: “The first page and the running dates are in Helen Taylor’s hand, the forms being characteristic of her later style; the remainder is in that of Fanny Erskine, who acted as literary secretary to Helen Taylor in the summer of 1875,” at which time Mr. Allen concludes the copy was made. In view of Helen Taylor’s reverence for Mill, and her preservation of similar MSS, it is surprising that the original is not known. It may have been sold at Avignon by the bookseller Romanille, in his sale of May 21–28, 1905, and be still in France.
3. A few items have thus far defied identification, the most difficult being “An article on wages and profits, capital & prices, which appeared in the Edinburgh [cancelled Review] Times [interlined Times] of [sic] May 1825 [cancelled 4 interlined 5].” (MS, f. 3; MacMinn, 6.) I have not located any file of this newspaper, which was advertised in the Examiner, January 16, 1825, to appear first on January 22, 1825, as a weekly (cf. Jacob Viner’s review of MacMinn’s edition, Modern Philology, XLIII [1945], 150).
4. The following table will give some idea of the comparative frequency of issue of Library editions of Mill’s major works in his lifetime:
5. For example, the item listing “Corporation and Church Property” concludes: “printed also as a separate tract and entitled ‘Corporation and Church Property reformable [Resumable] by the State.’” (MS, f. 10; MacMinn, 25.) Copies of the reprint, which Professor MacMinn was not able to find, are in the University of London Library (autograph copy to George Grote) and the Somerville College Library.
6. Copies of both reprints are in the Somerville College Library; a reprint of the article on Bentham is in the Hollander Collection, University of Illinois. The search for such reissues is never-ending; I would appreciate any information, in view of the new edition of the Bibliography.
7. This note, evidently written after Mill had been a Member of Parliament, occurs in the bibliography (MS, f. 37 r&v; MacMinn, 96) after the entry for the Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy; the last preceding dated item is for April 29, 1865. Little faith can be placed in the date, however, as the note must have been added later. Some of the omissions in the bibliography are covered in the introduction by Ney MacMinn and his fellow editors, and others in Jacob Viner’s review, cited above.
8. A complete list of these identifications follows. The articles by James Mill are identified in the volumes by a dash (“–”) and occasionally by his name; those by J. S. Mill by a plus sign (“+”) and twice by his name. The other identifications are by name or initial in pencil.
Vol. I (No. 1, Jan., 1824), Art. XI, pp. 206–68, James Mill.
Vol. I (No. 2, Apr., 1824), Art. X, pp. 505–41, J. S. Mill.
Vol. II (No. 3, July, 1824), Art. II, pp. 27–48, J. S. Mill.
Vol. II (No. 4, Oct., 1824), Art. I, pp. 289–310, [George] Grote.
Ibid., Art. V, pp. 346–402, J. S. Mill.
Ibid., Art...
| Title | No. of Editions | Dates of First and Last Editions |
| System of Logic | 8 | 1843, 1872 |
| Principles of Political Economy | 7 | 848, 1871 |
| On Liberty | 4 | 1859, 1869 |
| Representative Government | 3 | 1861, 1865 |
| Utilitarianism | 3 | 1863, 1867 |
| Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy | 4 | 1865, 1872 |
| The Subjection of Woman | 3 | 1869, 1870 |
