"Ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes Emollit mores, nec sinit esse seros" (manuscript essay), 1798 December 6

Three-page handwritten essay in English by Buckminster on the role of the arts in humanity's progress. The essay is titled with a quote from Ovid that can be translated, "A faithful study of the liberal arts refines the manners and corrects their harshness." The essay begins, "To a philosophic mind it is highly interesting to mark the progress of refinement."

Mathematical notebook, and commonplace book, circa 1689-1769

Manuscript notebook, possibly kept by Harvard students, containing 17th century English transcriptions of arithmetic and geometry texts, one of which is dated 1689-1690; 18th century transcriptions from John Ward’s “The Young Mathematician’s Guide”; and notes on physics lectures delivered by John Winthrop, the Hollis Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at Harvard from 1738 to 1779. The notebook also contains 18th century reading notes on Henry VIII, Tudor succession, and English history from Daniel Neal’s “The History of the Puritans” and David Hume’s “History of England,” and notes on Ancient history, taken mainly from Charles Rollin’s “The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Medes and Persians, Macedonians and Grecians.” Additionally included are an excerpt from Plutarch’s “Lives” and transcriptions of three articles from “The Gentleman’s Magazine, and Historical Chronicle,” published in 1769: “A Critique on the Works of Ovid”; a book review of “A New Voyage to the West-Indies”; and “Genuine Anecdotes of Celebrated Writers, &.” The flyleaf contains the inscription “Semper boni aliquid operis facito ut diabolus te semper inveniat occupatum,” a variation on a quote of Saint Jerome that translates approximately as “Always good to do some work so that the devil may always find you occupied.” In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Harvard College undergraduates often copied academic texts and lecture notes into personal notebooks in place of printed textbooks. Winthrop used Ward’s textbook in his class, while the books of Hume, Neal, and Rollin were used in history courses taught at Harvard in the 18th century.

New Orleans, Louisiana, 1884 (Raster Image)

This layer is a georeferenced raster image of the historic paper map entitled: Map of the city of New Orleans showing location of exposition grounds and all approaches thereto by land & water, [by] the World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition, New Orleans, La., U.S.A., Department of Installation. It was published by The Exposition ca. 1884. Scale [ca. 1:2,000]. Covers also adjacent portions of Jefferson and St. Bernard Parishes. The image inside the map neatline is georeferenced to the surface of the earth and fit to the Louisiana State Plane Coordinate System, South NAD83 (in Feet) (Fipszone 1702). All map collar and inset information is also available as part of the raster image, including any inset maps, profiles, statistical tables, directories, text, illustrations, or other information associated with the principal map. This map shows features such as exposition grounds, railroads, roads, canals, levees, drainage, block numbers, land ownership in outlying areas, selected public and industrial buildings, cemeteries, Parish boundaries, ferry routes, and more. Depths shown by soundings. Includes inset views, plans, and engravings: Perspective view of the buildings and grounds from the Northeast -- Mexican national headquarters -- Grand Rapids (Mich.) furniture pavilion -- [South pass] -- View of New Orleans in 1719 -- Railroad map of Louisiana and Texas -- Plan of New Orleans in 1770 by Capt.n Pittman of the British Army -- Ground plan -- United States and state exhibits -- Art gallery -- Main building -- Factories and Mills -- Horticultural hall. This layer is part of a selection of digitally scanned and georeferenced historic maps from The Harvard Map Collection as part of the Imaging the Urban Environment project. Maps selected for this project represent major urban areas and cities of the world, at various time periods. These maps typically portray both natural and manmade features at a large scale. The selection represents a range of regions, originators, ground condition dates, scales, and purposes.