[Note XXI.]
III. 4. 159. As Pope's correction, however ingenious and plausible, cannot be pronounced certain, we, in accordance with the general rule laid down in the Preface to Vol. I., p. xii, retain the reading of the Folios. 'Scope of Nature' may mean anything which lies within the limits of Nature's power.
[Note XXII.]
IV. 1. 70. Warburton, after quoting Pope's reading, which he adopts, remarks: "Thus Mr Pope found the line in the old editions.... Mr Theobald, by what authority I don't know, reads:
'I would not have believ'd him: no tongue, but Hubert's,'
which is spoiling the measure without much mending the sense." Johnson adds, 'I do not see why the old reading may not stand. Mr Theobald's alteration, as we find, injures the measure, &c.' Neither Warburton nor Johnson could have consulted the Folios on this passage, or they would have seen that Pope's reading is not the reading of the old editions, and that Theobald's 'unauthorized alteration' was merely a return to the original text.
[Note XXIII.]
IV. 2. 50. Sidney Walker (Criticisms, I. 279) questions the possibility of Shakespeare having written so ungrammatically. The construction is evidently incorrect, but it may be explained by supposing that the offending word 'them,' following so closely upon 'my self,' was suggested to the writer by the analogous pronoun 'themselves.'