The Number of Passages amended, and admirably Explained, which I have taken care to distinguish with his Name, will shew a Fineness of Spirit and Extent of Reading, beyond all the Commendations I can give them: Nor, indeed, would I any farther be thought to commend a Friend, than, in so doing, to give a Testimony of my own Gratitude. How great a share soever of Praise I must lose from my self, in confessing these Assistances; and however my own poor Conjectures may be weaken’d by the Comparison with theirs; I am very well content to sacrifice my Vanity to the Pride of being so assisted, and the Pleasure of being just to their Merits. I beg leave to observe to my Readers, in one Word, here, that from the Confession of these successive Aids, and the Manner in which I deriv’d them, it appears, I have pretty well fill’d up the Interval, betwixt my first Proposals and my Publication, with having my Author always in View, and at Heart.
Some Hints I have the Honour to owe to the Informations of Dr. Mead, and the late Dr. Friend: Others to the Kindness of the ingenious Martin Folkes, Esq; who likewise furnish’d me with the first folio Edition of Shakespeare, at a Time when I could not meet with it among the Booksellers; as my obliging Friend Thomas Coxeter, Esq; did with several of the old 4to single Plays, which I then had not in my own Collection. Some few Observations I likewise owe to F. Plumptree, Esq; Others to the Favour of anonymous Persons: for all which I most gladly render my Acknowledgments.
The Editor’s particular Pains taken. As to what regards my self singly, if the Edition do not speak for the Pains I have taken about it, it will be very vain to plead my own Labour and Diligence. Besides a faithful Collation of all the printed Copies, which I have exhibited in my Catalogue of Editions at the End of this Work; let it suffice to say, that, to clear up several Errors in the Historical Plays, I purposely read over Hall and Holingshead’s Chronicles in the Reigns concern’d; all the Novels in Italian, from which our Author had borrow’d any of his Plots; such Parts of Plutarch, from which he had deriv’d any Parts of his Greek or Roman Story: Chaucer and Spenser’s Works; all the Plays of B. Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, and above 800 old English Plays, to ascertain the obsolete and uncommon Phrases in him: Not to mention some Labour and Pains unpleasantly spent in the dry Task of consulting Etymological Glossaries.
But as no Labour of Mine can be equivalent to the dear and ardent Love I bear for Shakespeare, so, if the Publick shall be pleas’d to allow that He owes any Thing to my Willingness and Endeavours of restoring Him; I shall reckon the Part of my Life so engag’d, to have been very happily employ’d: and put Myself, with great Submission, to be try’d by my Country in the Affair.
The Editors of THE AUGUSTAN REPRINT SOCIETY
are pleased to announce that
THE WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY
of The University of California, Los Angeles
will become the publisher of the Augustan Reprints in May, 1949. The editorial policy of the Society will continue unchanged. As in the past, the editors will strive to furnish members inexpensive reprints of rare seventeenth and eighteenth century works.
[Transcriber’s Note:
Many of the listed titles are or will be available from Project Gutenberg. Where possible, a link to the e-text is given.]