[11] This paragraph, apparently so unconnected with the preceding, refers to some critical dissertations on the character of Vice. They may be found in Malone's Shakespeare, xix. 244. See likewise Pursuits of Literature, Dialogue the First.—Ed.
[12] Chetwood says, that during one season it was exhibited 75 times.
See his History of the Stage, p. 68.—Ed.
[13] Dr. Johnson told Mrs. Siddons that he admired her most in this
character.—Mrs. Piozzi.
[14] This statement is not quite accurate concerning the seven spurious plays, which the printer of the folio in 1664 improperly admitted into his volume. The name of Shakespeare appears only in the title-pages of four of them: Pericles, Sir John Oldcastle, the London Prodigal, and the Yorkshire Tragedy. Malone's Shak. xxi. 382.
[15] The first seven books of Chapman's Homer were published in the year 1596, and again in 1598. The whole twenty-four of the Iliad appeared in 1611.—STEEVENS.
[16] Dr. Johnson should rather have said that the managers of the
theatres-royal have decided, and that the public has been obliged
to acquiesce in their decision. The altered play has the upper
gallery on its side; the original drama was patronized by Addison:
Victrix causa Diis placuit, sed victa Catomi. LUCAN. Malone's
Shak. x. 290.
[17] See, however, Mr. Boswell's long and erudite note in his
Shakespeare, vii. 536. "Il me semble," says Madame De Staël, "cu'en
lisant cette tragédie, on distingue parfaitement dans Hamlet
l'égarement réel à travers l'égarement affecté."—Mme. De Staël de
la Littérature, c. xiii. See also Schlegel in his Dramatic
literature, ii.—Ed.
AN ACCOUNT OF THE HARLEIAN LIBRARY.
To solicit a subscription for a catalogue of books exposed to sale, is an attempt for which some apology cannot but be necessary; for few would willingly contribute to the expense of volumes, by which neither instruction nor entertainment could be afforded, from which only the bookseller could expect advantage, and of which the only use must cease, at the dispersion of the library[1].
Nor could the reasonableness of an universal rejection of our proposal be denied, if this catalogue were to be compiled with no other view, than that of promoting the sale of the books which it enumerates, and drawn up with that inaccuracy and confusion which may be found in those that are daily published.