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The reputation confequent on tafks of that nature invited me to attempt the method here; with this view, the hopes of reftoring to the public their greatest poet in his original purity after having foo long lain in a condition that was a disgrace to common fenfe. Eo this end I have ventured on a labour, that is the firft affay of the kind on any modern author whatsoever. For the late edition. of Milton by the learned Dr. Bentley is, in the main, a performance of another fpecies. It is plain, it was the intention of that great man rather to correct and pare off the excrefcences of the Paradife Loft, in the manner that Tucca and Varius were employed to criticize the Æneis of Virgil, than to restore corrupted paffages. Hence, therefore, may be seen either the iniquity or ignorance of his cenfurers, who, from fome expreffions, would make us believe, the Doctor every where gives us his corrections as the original text of the author; whereas the chief turn of his criticism is plainly to fhew the world, that if Milton did not write as he would have him, he ought to have wrote fo.

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I thought proper to premife this obfervation to the readers, as it will fhew that the critic on Shakespeare is of a quite different kind. His genuine text is religiously adhered to, and the numerous faults and blemishes, purely his own, are left as they were found. Nothing is altered, but what by the clearest reasoning can be proved a corruption of the true text; and the alteration, a

real restoration of the genuine reading. Nay, fo strictly have I ftrove to give the true reading, tho' fometimes not to the advantage of my author, that I have been ridiculously ridiculed for it by those, who either were iniquitously for turning every thing to my disadvantage; or else were totally ignorant of the true duty of an editor.

The science of criticism, as far as it affects an editor, feems to be reduced to thefe three claffes; the emendation of corrupt paffages; the explanation of obfcure and difficult ones; and an inquiry into the beauties and defects of compofition. This work is principally confined to the two former parts; tho' there are some specimens interspersed of the latter kind, as feveral of the emendations were best supported, and several of the difficulties beft explained, by taking notice of the beauties and defects of the compofition peculiar to this immortal poet. But this was but occafional, and for the fake only of perfecting the two other parts, which were the proper objects of the editor's labour. The third lies open for every willing undertaker: and I shall be pleased to fee it the employment of a masterly pen.

It must neceffarily happen, as I have formerly obferved, that where the affiftance of manufcripts is wanting to fet an author's meaning right, and and rescue him from those errors which have been tranfmitted down thro' a series of incorrect editions, and a long intervention of time, many paffages

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must be desperate, and past a cure'; and their true fenfe irretrievable either to care or the fagacity of conjecture. But is there any reafon therefore to fay, that because all cannot be retrieved, all ought to be left defperate? We fhould fhew very little honefty, or wifdom, to play the tyrants with an Author's text; to raze, alter, innovate, and overturn, at all adventures, and to the utter detriment of his fenfe and meaning: But to be fo very referved and cautious, as to interpofe no relief or conjecture, where it manifeftly labours and cries out for affiftance, feems, on the other hand, an indolent abfurdity.

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But because the art of criticifm, both by thofe who cannot form a true judgment of its effects, nor can penetrate into its caufes, (which takes in a great number befides the Ladies;) is efteemed only an arbitrary capricious tyranny exercised on books; I think proper to fubjoin a word or two about thofe rules on which I have proceeded, and by which I have regulated myself in this edition. By this, I flatter myfelf, it will appear, my emendations are 'fo far from being arbitrary or capricious, that they are established with a very high degree of moral certainty.

As there are very few pages in Shakespeare, upon which fome fufpicions of depravity do not reasonably arife; I have thought it my duty, in the first place, by a diligent and laborious collation to take in the affiftances of all the old copies.

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In his Hiftorical Plays, whenever our English

VOL. I.

b

Chro

Chronicles, and in his Tragedies when Greek or Roman ftory, could give any light; no pains have been omitted to fet paffages right by comparing my Author with his originals: for, as I have frequently obferved, he was a clofe and accurate copier wherever his Fable was founded on History.

Wherever the Author's fenfe is clear and difcoverable, (tho', perchance, low and trivial;) I have not by any innovation tampered with his text; out of an oftentation of endeavouring to make him speak better than the old copies have done.

Where, thro' all the former editions, a paffage has laboured under flat nonfenfe and invincible darknefs, if, by the addition or alteration of a letter or two, I have reftored to him both fenfe and >fentiment, such corrections, I am perfuaded, will need no indulgence.

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And whenever I have taken a greater latitude and liberty in amending, I have conftantly endeavoured to fupport my corrections and conjectures by parallel paffages and authorities from himself, the fureft means of expounding any author whatfoever. Cette voie d'interpreter un autheur par luimême est plus fure que tous les commentaires, fays a very learned French critic.

As to my Notes, (from which the common and learned readers of our Author, I hope, will derive fome pleasure ;) I have endeavoured to give them a variety in fome proportion to their number. Where, ever I have ventured at an emenda

tion, a Note is conftantly fubjoined to justify and

affert

affert the reason oflit. Where I only offer a con jecture, and do not disturb the text, I fairly fet forth my grounds for fuch conjecture, and fubmit it to judgment. Some remarks are spent in explaining paffages, where the wit or fatire depends on an obfcure point of history: Others, where allufions are to divinity, philofophy, or other branches of fcience. Some are added to fhew, where there is a fufpicion of our Author having borrowed from the antients: Others, to fhew where he is rallying his contemporaries; or where he himself is rallied by them. And fome are neceffarily thrown in, to explain an obfcure and obfolete Term, Phrafe, or Idea.

In reforming an infinite number of paffages, in the Pointing, where the fenfe was before quite loft, I have frequently fubjoined notes to fhew the depraved, and to prove the reformed, pointing: a part of labour in this work which I could very willingly have fpared myfelf. May it not be objected, why then have you burdened us with these notes? The answer is obvious, and, if I mistake not, very material. Without fuch notes, these paffages in fubfequent editions would be liable, through the ignorance of printers and correctors, to fall into the old confufion: whereas, a note on every one hinders all poffible return to depravity; and for ever fecures them in a ftate of purity and integrity not to be loft or forfeited.

Again, as fome notes have been neceffary to point out the detection of the corrupted text,