We have feen the flur that is endeavoured to be thrown upon them indifcriminately by the player editors, and we fee it too wiped off by their having themfelves followed the copies that they condemn. A modern editor, who is not without his followers, is pleafed to affert confidently in his preface, that they are printed from " piece-meal parts, and copies of prompters:" but his arguments for it are fome of them without foundation, and the others not decifive; and it is to be doubted, that the opinion is only thrown out to countenance an abufe that has been carried to much too great lengths by himself and another editor,-that of putting out of the text paffages that they did not like. These cenfures then and this opinion being fet afide, is it criminal to try another conjecture, and fee what can be made of it? It is known, that SHAKESPEARE lived to no great age, being taken off in his fifty-third year; and yet his work's are fo numerous, that, when we take a furvey of them, they feem the productions of a life of twice that length: for to the thirty-fix plays in this collection, we must add feven, (one of which is in two parts) perhaps written over again; (4) feven others that were published, fome of them in his life-time, and all with his name; and another seven, that are upon good grounds afcribed to him; making in all, fifty-eight plays; befides the part that he may reasonably be thought to have had in other men's labours, being himself a player and manager of theatres: what his productions were,

NOTE.

written by doctor LEG, author of another play, call'd "The Destruction of Jerufalem." And there is in the Mufæum, a manufcript Latin play upon the fame fubject, written by one Henry LACY in 1586: which Latin play is but a weak performance; and yet feemeth to be the play ipoken of by Sir John HARRINGTON, (for the author was a Cambridge man, and of Saint John's) in this paffage of his "Apologie of Poetrie," prefix'd to his tranflation of ARIOSTO's Orlando," edit. 1591, fol. ""and for Tragedies, to omit other famous

we know not: but it can hardly be fuppofed, that he, who had fo confiderable a fhare in the confidence of the earls of Effex and Southampton, could be a mute spectator only of controverfies in which they were fo much interested; and his other poetical works, that are known, will fill a volume the fize of these that we have here. When the number and bulk of these pieces, the shortness of his life, and the other bufy employments of it are reflected upon duly, can it be a wonder that he should be fo loose a transcriber of them? or why should we refuse to give credit to what his companions tell us, of the state of those transcriptions, and of the facility with which they were pen'd? Let it then be granted, that these quartos are the poet's own copies, however they were come by; haftily written at firft, and iffuing from presses most of them as corrupt and' licentious as can any where be produced, and not overseen by himself, nor by any of his friends and there can be no ftronger reafon for fubfcribing to any opinion, than may be drawn in favour of this from the condition of all the other plays that were firft printed in the folio: for, in method of publication, they have the greatest likeness poffible to thofe which preceded them, and carry all the fame marks of hafte and negligence; yet the genuineness of the latter is attefted by those who publish'd them, and no proof brought to invalidate their teftimony. If it be ftill afk'd, what then becomes of the accufation brought against the quartos by the player editors?

NOTE.

"tragedies; that, that was played at St. John's in Cambridge, of "Richard the 3. would move (I thinke) Phalaris the tyraunt, and "terrifie all tyranous minded men, fro following their foolish am"bitious humors, feeing how his ambition made him kill his bro"ther, his dephews, his wife, beide infinit others; and laft of all after a fhort and troublesome raigne, to end his miferable life, and to have his body harried after his death."

(4) Vide this Introduction, p. 132, and the table of editions at the end..

the answer is not fo far off as may perhaps be expected: It may be true that they were " ftoln;" but ftoln from the author's copies, by transcribers who found means to get at them (5) and "maim'd" they muft needs be, in respect of their many alterations after the first performance: and who knows, if the difference that is between them, in fome of the plays that are common to them both, has not been ftudiously heighten'd by the player editors,-who had the means in their power of being mafters of all the alterations,-to give at once a greater currency to their own lame edition, and support the charge which they bring against the quartos ? this, at least, is a probable opinion, and no bad way of accounting for those differences. (6)

It were easy to add abundance of other arguments in favour of these quartos ;-fuch as their exact affinity to almost all the publications of this fort that came out about that time; of which it will hardly be afferted by any reasoning man, that they are all clandeftine copies, and publish'd without their author's confent: next, the high improbability of fuppofing that none of these plays were of the poet's own setting-out: whose cafe is rendered fingular by such a fuppofition; it being certain, that every other author of the time, without exception, who wrote any thing largely, published fome of his plays himself, and BEN JONSON all of

NOTE.

(5) But fee a note at p. 134, which feems to infer that they were fairly come by: which is, in truth, the editor's opinion, at least of fome of them; though, in way of argument, and for the fake of clearness, he has here admitted the charge in that full extent in which they bring it.

(6) Some of these alterations are in the quartos themselves; (another proof this, of their being authentick) as in "Richard II:" where a large fcene, that of the king's depofing, appears first in the copy of 1608, the third quarto impreffion, being wanting in the two former: and in one copy of "2. Hen. IV, there is a scene too that is not in the other, though of the fame year; it is the first of

them: nay, the very errors and faults of these quartos,fome of them at least, and those such as are brought against them by other arguers, are, with the editor, proofs of their genuineness; for from what hand, but that of the author himself, could come those seemingly-ftrange repetitions which are spoken of at p. 133? thofe imperfect entries, and entries of persons who have no concern in the play at all, neither in the scene where they are made to enter, nor in any other part of it? yet such there are in feveral of these quartos ; and fuch might well be expected in the hafty draughts of fo negligent an author, who neither faw at once all he might want, nor, in fome inftances, gave himself fufficient time to confider the fitness of what he was then penning. These and other like arguments might, as is faid before, be collected, and urged for the plays that were first publish'd in the quartos; that is, for fourteen of them, for the other fix are out of the question: but what has been enlarged upon above, of their being followed by the folio, and their apparent general likeness to all the other plays that are in that collection, is fo very forcible as to be fufficient of itself to fatisfy the unprejudiced,,that the plays of both impreffions fpring all from the same stock, and owe their numerous imperfections to one common original and cause,-the too-great negligence and hafte of their over-careless producer.

NOTE.

aft the third. And "Hamlet" has fome ftill more confiderable; for the copy of 1605 has these words,-" Newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according to the true and perfect coppie." Now though no prior copy has been yet produced, it is certain there was fuch by the teftimony of the title-page: and that the play was in being at leaft nine years before, is proved by a book of doctor LODGE's, printed in 1596; which play was perhaps an imperfect one; and not unlike that we have now of "Romeo and juliet," printed the year after; a fourth inftance too of what the note advances.

But to return to the thing immediately treated,-the ftate of the old editions. The quartos went through many impreffions, as may be feen in the table: and, in each play, the laft is generally taken from the impreffion next before it, and fo onward to the firft; the few that come not within this rule, are taken notice of in the table: and this further is to be obferved of them, that, generally fpeaking, the more diftant they are from the original, the more they abound in faults; 'till, in the end, the corruptions of the laft copies become fo exceffive, as to make them of hardly any worth. The folio too had its re-impreffions, the dates and notices of which are likewife in the table, and they tread the fame round as did the quartos: only that the third of them has feven plays more, (fee their titles below (7) in which it is followed by the laft: and that again by the first of the modern impreffions, which come now to be spoken .of.

If the ftage be a mirror of the times, as undoubtedly it is, and we judge of the age's temper by what we fee prevailing there, what muft we think of the times that fucceeded Shakespeare? Jonfon, favoured by a court that delighted only in mafques, had been gaining ground upon him even in his life-time; and his death put him in full poffeffion of a poft he had long afpired to, the empire of the drama: the

NOTE.

(7) "Locrine; The London Prodigal; Pericles Prince of Tyre; The Puritan, or, the Widow of Watling-ftreet; Sir John Oldcastle; Thomas Lord Cromwel; and the Yorkshire Tragedy." And the imputed ones, mentioned a little above, are three; The Arraignment of Paris; Birth of Merlin; Fair Em; Edward III; Merry Devil of Edmonton, Mucedorus; and the two noble Kinfmen." But in the "Merry Devil of Edmonton," Rowley is called his partner in the title-page; and Fletcher, in "The two noble Kinfmen." What external proots there are of their coming from Shakespeare, are gathered all together, and put down in the table; and further it not concerns us to engage: but let those who are inclined to difpute it, carry this