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 juftify or excuse the contraction of the reft.

30

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

Our authour 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 difpatches its work by the eafieft means. He had un doubtedly read much; his acquaintance with cuftoms, 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 haftily makes what a little more attention would have found. He is folicitous to reduce to grammar, what he could not be fure that his authour intended to be grammatical. Shakespeare regarded more the series of ideas, than of words; and his language, not being defigned for the reader's desk, 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 meafures reformed in fo many paffages, by the filent labours of fome editors, with the filent acquiefcence of the reft, that he thought himfelf allowed to extend a little further the licenfe, which had already been carried fo far without reprehenfion;

and

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 supposes all to be right that was done by Pope and Theobald; he seems not to fufpect a critick of fallibility, and it was but reafonable that he should claim what he fo liberally granted..

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

Of the last editor it is more difficult to fpeak. Respect is due to high place, tenderness to living reputation, and veneration to genius and learning; but he cannot be justly offended at that liberty of which he has himself fo frequently given an example, nor very folicitous. what is thought of notes, which he ought never to have confidered as part of his ferious employments, and which, I fuppofe, fince the ardour of compofition is remitted, he no longer numbers among his happy effufions.

The original and predominant errour of his commentary, is acquiefcence in his first thoughts; that precipitation which is produced by confcioufnefs of quick difcernment; and that confidence which prefumes to do, by furveying the furface, what labour only can perform, by penetrating the bottom. His notes exhi bit fometimes perverfe interpretations, and fometimes improbable conjectures; he at one time gives the authour more profundity of meaning than the fentence admits, and at another discovers abfurdities, where the fenfe is plain to every other reader. But his emenda

tions are likewise often happy and juft; and his interpretation of obfcure paffages learned and fagacious.

Of his notes, I have commonly rejected thofe, against which the general voice of the publick has exclaimed, or which their own incongruity immediately condemns, and which, I fuppofe, the authour himself would defire to be forgotten. Of the reft, to part I have given the highest approbation, by inferting the offered reading in the text; part I have left to the judgment of the reader, as doubtful, though fpecious; and part I have cenfured without reserve, but I am fure without bitterness of malice, and, I hope, without wantonness of infult.

It is no pleasure to me, in revifing my volumes, to obferve how much paper is waited in confutation. Whoever confiders the revolutions of learning, and the various questions of greater or lefs importance, upon which wit and reafon have exercised their powers, muft lament the unfuccessfulness of enquiry, and the flow advances of truth, when he reflects, that great part of the labour of every writer is only the deftruction of those that went before him. The first care of the builder of a new fyftem, is to. demolish the fabricks which are standing. The chief defire of him that comments an authour, is to fhew how much other commentators have corrupted and obfcured him. The opinions prevalent in one age, as truths above the reach of controverfy, are confuted and rejected in another, and rife again to reception in remoter times. Thus the human mind is kept in motion without progrefs. Thus fometimes truth and errour, and fometimes contrarieties of errour, take each others place by reciprocal invafion.

The tide of feeming knowledge which is poured over one generation,, retires and leaves another naked and barren; the fudden meteors of intelligence which for a while appear to fhoot their beams into the regions of obfcurity, on a fudden withdraw their luftre, and leave mortals again to grope their way.

Thefe

These elevations and depreffions of renown, and the contradictions to which all improvers of knowledge muft for ever be expofed, fince they are not efcaped by the highest and brightest of mankind, may furely be endured with patience by criticks and annotators, who can rank themselves but as the fatellites of their authours. How canft thou beg for life, fays Achilles to his captive, when thou knowest that thou art now to fuffer only what must another day be suffered by Achilles ?

Dr. Warburton had a name fufficient to confer celebrity on those who could exalt themselves into antagonifts, and his notes have raised a clamour too loud to be diftinct. His chief affailants are the authours of the Canons of criticism and of the Review of Shakespeare's text; of whom one ridicules his errours with airy petulance, fuitable enough to the levity of the controverfy; the other attacks them with gloomy malignity, as if he were dragging to juftice an affaffin or incendiary. The one ftings like a fly, fucks a little blood, takes a gay flutter, and returns for more; the other bites like a vi-per, and would be glad to leave inflammations and gangrene behind him. When I think on one, with his con-federates, I remember the danger of Coriolanus, who was afraid that girls with spits, and boys with stones, bould flay him in puny battle; when the other croffes my imagination, I remember the prodigy in Macbeth,.

An eagle tow'ring in bis pride of place,

Was by a moufing owl hawk'd at and killd.

Let me however do them juftice. One is a wit, and one a scholar. They have both fhewn acutenefs fufficient in the difcovery of faults, and have both advanced. fome probable interpretations of obfcure paffages; but when they afpire to conjecture and emendation, it appears how falfely we all eftimate our own abilities, and the little which they have been able to perform might

have taught them more candour to the endeavours of others.

Before Dr. Warburton's edition, Critical obfervations on Shakespeare had been published by Mr. Upton, a man skilled in languages, and acquainted with books, but who feems to have had no great vigour of genius or nicety of tafte. Many of his explanations are curious and useful, but he likewife, though he profeffed to oppofe the licentious confidence of editors, and adhere to the old copies, is unable to reftrain the rage of emendation, though his ardour is ill feconded by his skill. Every cold empirick, when his heart is expanded by a fuccessful experiment, fwells into a theorift, and the laborious collator at fome unlucky moment frolicks in conjecture.

Critical, hiftorical and explanatory notes have been likewise published upon Shakespeare by Dr. Grey, whofe diligent perufal of the old English writers has enabled him to make fome useful obfervations. What he undertook he has well enough performed; but as he neither attempts judicial nor emendatory criticifm, he employs rather his memory than his fagacity. It were to be wished that all would endeavour to imitate his modesty who have not been able to furpafs his knowledge.

I can fay with great fincerity of all my predeceffors, what I hope will hereafter be faid of me, that not one has left Shakespeare without improvement, nor is there one to whom I have not been indebted for affiftance and information. Whatever I have taken from them it was my intention to refer to its original authour, and it is certain, that what I have not given to another, I believed when I wrote it to be my own. In fome perhaps I have been anticipated; but if I am ever found to encroach upon the remarks of any other commentator, I am willing that the honour, be it more or less, fhould be transferred to the first claimant, for his right,

and