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As of the other editors, I have preferved the prefaces, I have likewise borrowed the author's life from Rowe, though not written with much elegance or fpirit; it relates however what is now to be known, and therefore deferves to pass through all fucceeding publications.

The nation had been for many years content enough with Mr. Rowe's performance, when Mr. Pope made them acquainted with the true ftate of Shakespeare's text, fhewed that it was extremely corrupt, and gave reafon to hope that there were means of reforming it. He collated the old copies, which none had thought to examine before, and restored many lines to their integrity; but, by a very compendious criticism, he rejected whatever he disliked, and thought more of amputation than of cure.

I know not why he is commended by Dr. War buton for diftinguishing the genuine from the fpurious plays. In this choice he exerted no judgment of his own; the plays which he received, were given by Hemings and Condel, the firft editors; and those which he rejected, though, according to the licentiousness of the prefs in those times, they were printed during Shakespeare's life, with his name, had been omitted by his friends, and were never added to his works before the edition of 1664, from which they were copied by the later printers,

This is a work which Pope feems to have thought unworthy of his abilities, being not able to suppress his contempt of the dull duty of an editor. He under

ftood

food but half his undertaking. The duty of a collator is indeed dull, yet, like other tedious tasks, is very neceffary; but an emendatory critick would ill difcharge his duty, without qualities very different from dulnefs. In perufing a corrupted piece, he must have before him all poffibilities of meaning, with all poffibilities of expreffion. Such must be his comprehenfion of thought, and fuch his copioufnefs of language. Out of many readings poffibie, he must be able to felect that which beft fuits with the state, opinions, and modes of language prevailing in every age, and with his author's particular caft of thought, and turn of expreffion. Such must be his knowledge, and fuch his tafte. Conjectural criticism demands more than humanity poffeffes, and he that exercises it with most praife, has very frequent need of indulgence. Let us now be told no more of the dull duty of an editor.

Confidence is the common confequence of fuccefs. They whofe excellence of any kind has been loudly celebrated, are ready to conclude, that their powers are univerfal. Pope's edition fell below his own expectations, and he was fo much offended, when he was found to have left any thing for others to do, that he paffed the latter part of his life in a state of hoftility with verbal criticism.

I have retained all his notes, that no fragment of fo great a writer may be loft; his preface, valuable alike for elegance of compofition and juftnefs of remark, and containing a general criticifm on his au

thor,

'thor, fo extenfive that little can be added, and fo exact, that little can be difputed, every editor has an intereft to suppress, but that every reader would demand its infertion.

Pope was fucceeded by Theobald, a man of narrow comprehenfion, and small acquifitions, with no native and intrinfic fplendor of genius, with little of the artificial light of learning, but zealous for minute accuracy, and not negligent in purfuing it. He collated the ancient copies, and rectified many errors. A man fo anxiously fcrupulous might have been expected to do more, but what little he did was commonly right.

In his reports of copies and editions he is not to! be trusted without examination. He speaks fometimes indefinitely of copies, when he has only one. In his enumeration of editions, he mentions the two firft folios as of high, and the third folio as of middle authority; but the truth is, that the first is equivalent to all others, and that the reft only deviate from it by the printer's negligence. Whoever has any of the folios has all, excepting thofe diverfities which mere reiteration of editions will produce. I collated them all at the beginning, but afterwards used only the first.

Of his notes I have generally retained those which he retained himself in his fecond edition, except when they were confuted by fubfequent annotators, or were too minute to merit prefervation. I have fometimes adopted his restoration of a comma, without inferting

the

the panegyrick in which he celebrated himfelf for his atchievement. The exuberant excrefcence of his diction I have often lopped, his triumphant exultations over Pope and Rowe I have fometimes fuppreffed, and his contemptible oftentation I have frequently concealed; but I have in fome places fhewn him, as he would have fhewn himself, for the reader's diverfion, that the inflated emptiness of fome notes may justify or excufe the contraction of the rest.

Theobald, thus weak and ignorant, thus mean and faithlefs, thus petulant and oftentatious, by the good luck of having Pope for his enemy, has escaped, and efcaped alone, with reputation, from this undertaking. So willingly does the world fupport thofe who folicit favour, against those who command reverence; and fo eafily is he praised, whom no man can envy.

Our author fell then into the hands of Sir Thomas Hanmer, the Oxford editor, a man, in my opinion, eminently qualified by nature for fuch ftudies. He had, what is the first requifite to emendatory criticism, that intuition by which the poet's intention is immediately discovered, and that dexterity of intellect which dispatches its work by the eafieft means. He had undoubtedly read much; his acquaintance with customs, opinions, and traditions, feems to have been large; and he is often learned without fhew. He feldom paffes what he does not understand, without an attempt to find or to make a meaning, and fometimes hastily makes what a little more attention would have found. He is folicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be fure that his author intended

to

to be grammatical. feries of ideas, than

Shakespeare regarded more the of words; and his language, not being defigned for the reader's defk, was all that he defired it to be, if it conveyed his meaning to the audience.

Hanmer's care of the metre has been too violently cenfured. He found the meafure reformed in fo many paffages, by the filent labours of fome editors, with the filent acquiefcence of the reft, that he thought himself allowed to extend a little further the licence, which had already been carried fo far without reprehenfion; and of his corrections in general, it must be confeffed, that they are often juft, and made commonly with the leaft poffible violation of the

text.

But, by inferting his emendations, whether invented or borrowed, into the page, without any notice of varying copies, he has appropriated the labour of his predeceffors, and made his own edition of little authority. His confidence indeed, both in himself and others, was too great; he fuppofes all to be right that was done by Pope and Theobald; he feems not to fufpect a critick of fallibility, and it was but reasonable that he should claim what he so liberally granted.

As he never writes without careful enquiry and diligent confideration, I have received all his notes, and believe that every reader will with for more.

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