The first separate, and exceedingly rare, edition of this allegorical atlas of German Romanticism. Part satire, part moral lesson, the atlas functions as an illustration of the moral landscape confronting humans, and their possible pathways through it.

The Atlas
In 1801, Franz Johann Joseph von Reilly (1766-1820) published a six-volume work entitled 'Bibliothek der Scherze mit einem satyrisch-allegorischen Atlasse' ('Library of Jokes with a Satirical-Allegorical Atlas') - an anthology he compiled with around 300 humorous anecdotes and stories. The contents were described in the Wiener Zeitung as follows: "... humorous and witty ideas that [...]surprises the mind in a pleasant way and forces the bright to laugh, but at least elicits a smile from the grumpy". Part of this anthology consisted of ten allegorical maps with accompanying explanatory texts. These allegorical maps, distributed across the six volumes of the 'Library of Jokes', and their explanations, were published separately by Reilly one year after the first publication, in 1802, as an atlas volume in landscape format, as here, with an allegorical title page. The title depicts Heracles at the Crossroads: an ancient Greek parable from Xenophon (Memorabilia 2.1.21–34), where Heracles encounters Kakía and Areté (female personifications of Vice and Virtue) at a fork in the road, and is offered a choice between a pleasant and easy life, or a harsh but glory-filled one. The parable's conflation of geographical and moral choice prefigures the content of the atlas, and the viewer is reminded of Heracles's dilemma when viewing the maps – the "moral paths" on the atlas are seldom the easiest routes.

The Map
As with many "regular" geographical atlases, Reilly's atlas begins with a general map – the map of the "Moralischen Welt". This is followed by nine detailed maps of the areas shown on the world map. The author writes:

"On these maps, virtues and vices, and good and bad inclinations, together with their consequences, are presented as geographical objects, and each map on its own, as well as all ten taken together, are brought into a kind of system, insofar as the nature of the matter allows". The general map shows a land surrounded by three seas (Sea of Abiding Joy, Sea of Despair, Sea Without a Bottom), and is populated by familiar symbols of topographical features - mountains, hills, deserts, water, buildings, vegetation, a walled city, a fortress:

"On the future maps the reader will see on an enlarged scale both the capital and the eight kingdoms that make up the moral world, and the following treatises will give him a precise description of them". Von Reilly directs the reader:

"All the inhabitants of this area see the light of day in the capital, which is called The City of Self-love. They all strive to possess undisturbed happiness, and this causes them to travel long distances to reach the land of peace, where they quite rightly hope to find this state… All bipedal animals without feathers, of which the divine Plato speaks, spend their lives travelling through the moral world, and all start from the city of self-love... The Land of Tranquility is regarded by every wise man in the moral realm as the goal of his journey..." The reader is thus directed to begin their moral journey in the city, and wend their way via the nine kingdoms to the Land of Tranquility ("Land der Ruhe") with its shores (once one has traversed the "Berge des Leichten Scheiden" - Mountains of Easy Separation) lapped by the Sea of Lasting Joy ("Meer der Bleibenden Freude"). The different routes present different moral choices and obstacles.

The City of Self-love is divided into two parts - the city quarter of "Selbstliebe" (self-love, or amour-propre) and the city quarter of "Eigenliebe" (Narcissism). In the district of Selbstliebe, The Alley of Patience, The Alley of Humility and The Alley of Harmony are home to honest people; here the world is in order, and no court is needed ("... a circumstance that would drive lawyers and speakers to despair"). Next to this area, however, lies the district of "Eigenliebe" with The Square of Self-pleasure, The Alley of Indiscretion, the Street of Boasting, and the Hills of Impudence. The inhabitants of this part of the city are called the Egoists. Fearing that enemies could invade their district, they have surrounded it with a Wall of Suspicion. The two parts of the city differ architecturally - the narrowness of the fortress is contrasted by an open garden city, from which one can, however, get to the first-mentioned city district through the hole in the Ground of Hypocrisy via an underground passage (presumably surfacing via the "Cloacke"!).

The city of self-love is followed by eight maps, which, from the general map, the reader sees represent lands on the other side of the "Strom der Wünsche" (Stream of Desires). They are:
1. The "Reiche der Liebe" - The Kingdom of Love.
2. The "Reiche des Erwerbes" - The Kingdom of Acquisition.
3. The "Reiche der Ehre" - The Kingdom of Honor.
4. The "Reiche der Heerschaft" – The Kingdom of Power (through which runs the "Canal der Gesetze" - the Canal of the Laws).
5. The Reiche der Wissens - The Kingdom of Knowledge (a watery landscape incorporating an archipelago of the "Eiland der geschich" - Island of History; "Reiner insel" - Pure Island; "Dichter Eiland" - Poet's Island; "Rechtler eiland" – Lawyer Island, featuring the "Hügel der Schelsucht" - Hill of Mischievousness; "Habegern" – greed; and "Vorgebirg des missvergraigens" - foothills of disgrace… von Reilly was no fan of lawyers!).
6. The "Reiche des Müssiggangs" - The Realm of Idleness.
7. The "Reiche der Speculation" - The Realm of Speculation.
8. The "Lande de Ruhe" - The Land of Tranquility, which, intriguingly, contains the rather excellent-sounding "Goldgruben des Fleis" - Gold Mines of Flesh!

"In each of the five kingdoms above the capital, which does not include the two western ones, there is only one path that leads to the Land of Tranquility". No path, however, leads to the promised land through the realms of Speculation and Idleness!

The Mapmaker
Franz Johann Joseph von Reilly (1766-1820) was a prolific cartographer and publisher and, producing maps at a rate of one per week for 17 active years, was responsible for the publication of over 800 maps, and atlases, including his monumental 'Schauplatz der fünf Theile der Welt' (1789-1806), a school atlas (1791-1792), a diplomatic atlas (1791-1798), an atlas of Silesia (1796), the work 'General Postal Atlas of the Whole World…' (1799), a 'Postal Atlas of Hungary…' (1802) and a 'Postal Atlas of Italy and Sicily' (1803).

Rarity
This "Atlas of the Moral World" is extremely rare. We are aware of three sets of the Bibliothek der Scherze (Tel Aviv University, Szeged University, and a private collection in the US), and only eight complete examples of the atlas (five in Austria, two in Germany, and another in the US).