# 1678 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 1678.

## Events

* February – English dramatist Thomas Otway, perhaps escaping from an unhappy love affair with his leading actress, obtains a commission in an English regiment serving in the Franco-Dutch War and is sent in July to Flanders.
* February 18 – The first part of English nonconformist John Bunyan's Christian allegory The Pilgrim's Progress, partly written while he was imprisoned for unlicensed preaching, is published in London.
* March – The novel La Princesse de Clèves, presumed to be by Madame de La Fayette, is published in Paris. It is set in 1558–1559 and an early example of a psychological novel.
* November – The English printer Joseph Moxon becomes the first tradesman to be elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of London.

## New books
### Prose

* Manuel Ambrosio de Filguera – Si sea lícito hacer los autos sacramentales en las iglesias
* John Barret – The Christian Temper, or, A Discourse Concerning the Nature and Properties of the Graces of Sanctification
* Jacob Boehme – Mysterium Magnum, oder Erkärung über das Erste Buch Mosis (Amsterdam & Frankfurt; contains a portrait of Boehme by N. van Werd)
* John Bunyan – The Pilgrim's Progress
* Ralph Cudworth – The True Intellectual System of the Universe
* Madame de La Fayette (anonymously) – La Princesse de Clèves
* Sir Thomas Herbert – Threnodia Carolina
* Thomas Hobbes – Decameron Physiologicum
* Josiah King – The Examination and Trial of Old Father Christmas Together with his Clearing by the Jury
* The Mowing-Devil: or, Strange News out of Hartford-Shire (a woodcut showing what is alleged to be the first crop circle)
* The Works of Geber, Englished by Richard Russell.
* Thomas Rymer – The Tragedies of the Last Age Considered
* Jacob Spon – Voyage d'Italie, de Dalmatie, de Grèce et du Levant
* Aernout van Overbeke – De rym-wercken

### Drama

* Anonymous
** Actio Curiosa
* John Banks – The Destruction of Troy
* Aphra Behn – Sir Patient Fancy
* William Chamberlayne – Wits Led by the Nose, or a Poet's Revenge published
* Thomas Corneille – Le Comte d'Essex
* John Dryden
** All for Love
** The Kind Keeper
* Thomas d'Urfey
** Trick for Trick
** Squire Oldsapp
* Edward Howard – The Man of Newmarket
* Nathaniel Lee – Mithridates, King of Pontus
* John Leanerd
** The Counterfeits
** The Rambling Justice
* Thomas Otway – Friendship in Fashion
* Samuel Pordage – The Siege of Babylon
* Edward Ravenscroft – The English Lawyer (adapted from George Ruggle's Latin play Ignoramus)
* Thomas Rawlins – Tunbridge Wells
** Titus Andronicus, or the Rape of Lavinia (adapted from Shakespeare's play)
* Thomas Shadwell
** The History of Timon of Athens the Man-Hater
** A True Widow
* Nahum Tate – Brutus of Alba

### Poetry

* Anne Bradstreet – Several Poems Compiled with Great Variety of Wit and Learning (posthumously published)
* Samuel Butler – Hudibras, Part 3
* Dorthe Engelbrechtsdatter – Själens aandelige Sangoffer ("The Souls Spiritual Offering of Song")

## Births

* January 10 – Paul Gabriel Antoine, French theologian (died 1743)
* July – Thomas Hearne, editor of medieval manuscripts (died 1735)
* December 14 – Daniel Neal, English historian (died 1743)
* Unknown dates
** Thomas Sherlock, English religious writer and bishop (died 1761)
** William Wogan, Welsh religious writer in English (died 1758)

## Deaths

* January 16 – Madeleine de Souvré, marquise de Sablé, French writer and salonnière (born 1599)
* March 10 – Jean de Launoy, French historian (born 1603)
* April 12 – Sir Thomas Stanley, English poet, writer and translator (born 1625)
* May 4 – Abraham Woodhead, English Catholic writer (born 1609)
* May 14 or 15 – Anna Maria van Schurman, Dutch poet and scholar (born 1607)
* August 16 – Andrew Marvell, English poet and politician (born 1621)
* August 17 – Guillaume Herincx, Netherlandish theologian (born 1621)
* November 21 – Robert Thoroton, English antiquary (born 1623)
* Unknown date – Theophilus Gale, English theologian (born 1628)
* Probable date – Richard Flecknoe English dramatist and poet (born c. 1600)