This collection consists of a rough and finished draft of Coates' lecture, which was delivered before the Phrenological Society of Philadelphia. In it he included a review of Boston professor John C. Warren's work on the nervous system.

Manuscript discussing the Gestalt concept of isomorphism, especially Wolfgang Kohler's view.

In the hand of Benjamin Franklin, "from the manuscript. Translated from the High Dutch."

In the hand of Franklin, "from a manuscript not yet printed."

Two bound manuscripts in French: "Lettre de Thrasibule a Leucipe" and "Lettre a E." The former is credited on the title page to Nicolas Freret (1688-1749), but has been attributed to d'Holbach.

This item also contains some newspapers clippings and a manuscript obituary of Julian Halliday Coxe (1833-1834), infant son of Daniel T. Coxe.

Palm-leaf book in Malay and Arabic.

This volume is the fifth part of a life of Jesus from Passion Week to Ascension, compiled from Gospel sources and translated from the German into the Delaware Indian language by Roth, who was a Moravian missionary at Sheshequim on the Susquehanna River. The manuscript was discovered in the house of Roth's son, Rev. John Rhodes, in 1831. Fly-leaf title: "Ein versuch, etc. The History of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ from Passion Week to his Ascension to Heaven. Translated into the Unami Dialect of the Delaware Language in the years 1770 and 1772 at Tschektschequamink on the Susquehannah ... Translated by Mr. Rhodes."

Manuscript copy of a printed work (Lisboa, Deslandes, 1686); includes poems, statement of Christian doctrine with Portuguese translation, three catechetical dialogues. Complete title is "Catecismo brasilico da doutrina Christáa, com o ceremonial dos sacramentos, & mais actos parochiaes; composto por padres doutos da Companhia de Jesus; emendado nesta segunda impressao pelo P. Bertholameu de Leam..."

Books of hours were among the most common devotional texts of the Middle Ages. Produced throughout western Europe until the early 16th century, books of hours were important status items, often elaborately illuminated, that might be tailored to the specific tastes of well-heeled clients to reflect interests in particular saints or to incorporate other elements of their personal lives and religious, political, or social commitments. Although the specifics of its origin remain uncertain, the APS Book of Hours is organized in a fairly typical fashion. Beginning with a calendar specifying feast days and other holy days, the book includes readings from the gospels, prayers (Obsecro te, O Intemerata), the Hours of the Virgin, the Hours of the Cross, the seven penitential psalms (6, 31, 37, 50, 101, 129), the litanies and prayers, the office for the dead, and additional prayers devoted to Saints Barbara, Anthony, Margaret, and Sebastian. Each of the 22 sections begins with a full-page illustration, many with additional vignettes. An additional vignette of a figure of death is included in the office of the dead. The volume was donated to the APS by Detmar Basse-Müller in 1806.

Books of hours were among the most common devotional texts of the Middle Ages. Produced throughout western Europe until the early 16th century, books of hours were important status items, often elaborately illuminated, that might be tailored to the specific tastes of well-heeled clients to reflect interests in particular saints or to incorporate other elements of their personal lives and religious, political, or social commitments. Although the illuminated pages have been removed from this book of hours, the gift of Timothy Matlack in 1811, it remains an elegant and ornate manuscript, with initials and line fillers in prominent gilt, red, and blue. Only one page remains from the calendar (the last), however many of the major elements of the book can be identified, including the prayers to the Virgin, the Stabat Mater Dolorosa and stations of the cross, the penitential psalms, litanies, and prayers, and the office of the dead.

A collection of hymns for saints arranged according to the calendar, written in the (Greek) Menaion type.

Transcription prepared by Edward I. George, under the direction of Rev. Gaius Jackson Slosser, as a senior thesis for a Bachelor of Sacred Theology, Western Theological Seminary. Records of Board meetings, October 1804 to July 1825, pertaining to missions in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan, primarily to Indians. Records of reading of journals, approval of awards of funds, handling of defectors, etc.

An abstract of this University of Pennsylvania dissertation states, "Institutionalization of the Catholic Church in Guatemala, i.e., the process of continuous crystalization of norms, organization, and framework which regulate religious behavior, is the main object of this study."

In October 1719, the Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends for Philadelphia and the Jersies reached consensus on a "book of discipline" governing the "establishment and order of meetings." The regulations covered both the conduct of the Quarterly and Monthly Meetings and the personal comportment of individual members, refining the bureaucratic structure of the meetings and laying out the powers of Overseers and other officials. It touches upon marriage (mandating endogamy), burial, and attendance at meetings, and cautions Friends to plainness of speech and dress, drinking, smoking, backbiting, and gaming. This version of the Book of Discipline is a manuscript copy made for the American Philosophical Society in 1820 "from and antient Copy in the possession of Timothy Matlack, Esqr."

This collection contains minutes of the Society, 1781-1975; minutes of the directors of the Corporation, 1929-1947; membership book (with signatures of early members), 1785; and names of later members. There are also deeds to the meeting house and burying ground; treasurers' accounts; reports of officers and committees; bills and receipts for constructing, maintaining, and repairing the meeting house; cancelled checks; and letters to the Society and its officers, especially Samuel Wetherill, 1883-1884.

Barbara Babcock (Department of English) and Nancy Parezo (American Indian Studies and Anthropology) are members of the faculty at the University of Arizona. Their oral history of women anthropologists in the southwestern United States was published in 1988 as Daughters of the Desert : Women Anthropologists and the Native American Southwest, 1880-1980. This related essay includes brief biographical discussions of over 30 women who worked in the southwestern United States between 1880 and 1945. It was published as "The leading edge: Women anthropologists in the native American Southwest, 1880-1945," El Palacio 92 (1986)

In a letter to the Librarian of the American Philosophical Society in 1901, Henry Charles Lea noted that a manuscript of this work was known to the compiler of "Biblioteca nova scriptorium Hispaniae," but no printed edition was known.

This volume was translated by Benjamin E. Green from the author's "Histoire des classes nobles et des classes anoblies" (1840), and presents the second side of a subject begun with "History of the Working and Burgher Classes."