A scarce French allegorical vanitas illustration, depicting the skeletal figure of Death issuing a warning to the living. Death, shown half length before a grand stone sepulchre, is wrapped in a winding sheet, his empty sockets staring out at the viewer. In the crook of the bones on his left arm he cradles a stone tablet, upon which is written a seven-line memento mori poem: ‘Toy qui n'est que poussiere, où prens tu ton orgueil? Ta misere en naissant nà rien de comparable. En retournant tout nuddans le fond dùn cercueil, il te faut foîitenir un Juge inexorable.’ (You who are only dust, from where do you draw your pride? Your misery at birth is nothing in comparison. Returning naked to the bottom of a coffin, you must meet an inexorable Judge). The spectre gestures at the final word, ‘inexorable,’ with his fatal dart. His scythe rests against the tomb in preparation for its grim harvest. The scene is completed by an hourglass, emblematic of the rapid passage of life, and, in the background, a screech owl, whose cry in the dead of night was a mark of ill omen.

Inscription below image reads: ‘Pecheur, il faut mourir, tu le scais pour certain, Et tu ne penses pas a faire penitenne. Helas le temps te presse, et peut-estre demain, Tu receuras de Dieu ta derniere Sentence.’ (Sinner, you must die, you know that for certain, and yet you do not consider doing penance. Alas, time is pressing on you, and perhaps tomorrow, you will receive God’s ultimate sentence.)

Nicolas Bonnart (1637-1718) was a French engraver, writer, publisher, and printseller. He was the oldest of ten children of the artist Henri Bonnart. A prolific printmaker, his works included architectural plans, portraits, Parisian scenes, caricatures, allegorical works, religious and devotional images, and almanacks.

Condition: Minor time toning, foxing, and creasing to margins, otherwise a strong clean impression. Blank on verso.