"And as thy thoughts were clear, so innocent, Our poets frequently boast of this chastity of language themselves. See the prologue to The Knight of the Burning Pestle. Lovelace, a poet of no small eminence, speaks of the great delicacy of expression even in the Custom of the Country : "View here a loose thought said with such a grace, Yet of this play Dryden asserts that it contains more bawdry than all his plays together. What must we say of these different accounts? Why, 'tis clear as day, that the style of the age was so changed, that what was formerly not esteemed in the least degree indecent, was now become very much so; just as in Chaucer, the very filthiest words are used without disguise, and, says Beaumont in excuse for him, he gave those expressions to low characters, with whom they were then in common use, and whom he could not therefore draw naturally without them. The same plea is now necessary for Beaumont himself and all his contemporary dramatic poets; but there is this grand and essential difference between the gross expressions of our old poets, and the more delicate lewdness of modern plays. In the former, gross expressions are generally the language of low life, and are given to characters which are set in despicable lights: In the latter, lewdness is frequently the characteristic of the hero of the comedy, and so intended to inflame the passions and cor Fletcher bishop of London-Seward. rupt the heart. Thus much is necessary in defence, not only of our authors, but of Mr Sympson and myself, for engaging in the publication of works which contain a great many indecencies, which we could have wished to have been omitted; and which, when I began to prepare my part of the work for the press, I had actually struck off, as far as I could do it without injuring the connection of the context; but the booksellers pressed, and indeed insisted upon their restoration: They very sensibly urged the last-mentioned plea, and thought that the bare notion of a curtailed edition would greatly prejudice the sale of it. We hope therefore that the reader will not be too severe on the editors of works which have great excellencies, and which in general tend to promote virtue and chastity, though the custom of the age made the authors not entirely abstain from expressions not then esteemed gross, but which now must offend every modest ear. Hitherto we have treated of our authors and their merit, something must be added of the attempt of the present editors to clear them from that mass of confusion and obscurity flung upon them by the inaccuracy of former editors, or what was worse, by the wilfulness and ignorance of our old players, who kept most of their plays many years in manuscript as mere play-house properties, to be changed and mangled by every new actor's humour and fancy. As this was the case of most of our old plays, the learned Mr Upton seems strangely mistaken in asserting that no more liberty ought to be taken in the correction of the old [mangled] text of Shakspeare, than with the two first [accurate] editions of Paradise Lost. Upon this groundless assertion are built those very undeserved reflections upon the eminent editors of Shakspeare, who are compared to the vice of the old comedy beating their author's original text with their daggers of lath.. Surely something very different from such sarcasm is due from every true lover of Shakspeare to those editors whose emendations have cleared so many obscurities, and made so many readers study and perceive innumerable excellencies which had otherwise been passed over unnoted and perhaps despised. For verbal criticism, when it means the restoring the true reading to the mangled text, very justly holds the palm from every other species of criticism, as it cannot be performed with success without comprehending all the rest; it must clearly perceive the style, manner, characters, beauties, and defects: and to this must be added some sparks of that original fire that animated the poet's own invention. No sooner, therefore, were criticisms wrote on our English poets, but each deep-read scholar, whose severer studies had made him frown with contempt on poems and plays, was taken in to read, to study, to be enamoured: He rejoiced to try his strength with the editor, and to become a critic himself: Nay, even Dr Bentley's strange absurdities in his notes on Milton had this good effect, that they engaged a Pearce to answer, and perhaps were the first motives to induce the greatest poet, the most universal genius,' one of the s Dr Zachary Pearce, late Bishop of Rochester.-Reed. 9 Mr Seward here ascribes to Bentley's notes on Milton con, sequences which they did not produce: Mr Pope's edition of Shakspeare appeared several years before Bentley published his edition of Milton; and, from the date and contents of the celebrated Letter of Bishop Warburton to Concannen (which, although it has not yet found its way to the press, Dr Akenside says, "will probably be remembered as long as any of this prelate's writings,") it manifestly appears, that the notes of that learned editor were, what he asserts them in his preface to have been, "among his younger amusements," and consequently prior to the publication of Bentley's Milton.-Reed. Mr greatest orators, and one of the most industrious scholars in the kingdom, each to become editors of Shakspeare. A Pope, a Warburton, and a Hanmer did honour to the science by engaging in cri ticism; but the worth of that science is most apparent from the distinction Mr Theobald gained in the learned world, who had no other claim to honour but as a critic on Shakspeare. In this light his fame remains fresh and unblasted, though the lightning of Mr Pope and the thunder of Mr Warburton have been both launched at his head. Pope being far too great an original himself to sub mit his own taste to that of Shakspeare's was fairly driven out of the field of criticism by the plain force of reason and argument; but he soon retired to his poetic citadel, and from thence played such a vol. ley of wit and humour on his antagonist, as gave him a very grotesque profile on his left; but he never drove him from his hold on Shakspeare, and his countenance on that side is still clear and unspotted. Mr Warburton's attack was more danger, ous; but though he was angry from the apprehension of personal injuries, yet his justice has still left Mr Theobald in possession of great numbers of excellent emendations, which will always render his name respectable. The mention of the merit of criticism in establishing the taste of the age, in raising respect in the contemptuous, and attention in the careless readers of our old poets, naturally leads us to an enquiry, whence it comes to pass, that whilst almost every one buys and reads the works of our late critical editors, nay almost every man of learning aims at imitating them and making emendations himself, yet it is still the fashion to flurt at the names of critic and commentator, and. almost to treat the very science with derision. The enquiry has been often made by critics themselves, and all have said, that it was owing to the strange mistakes and blunders of former critics, to men's engaging in a science which they had neither learning nor talents to manage and adorn. Each thinking himself exempt from the censure, and each having it retorted upon him in his turn. If this is the case, I am afraid all remedy is hopeless; if the great names above-mentioned did really want abilities for the province they undertook, who shall dare to hope that he possesses them? If frequent mistakes in an editor are totally to sink his merit, who can escape the common wreck?-But I am far from thinking this to be the sole or even the principal cause; and the two, which I shall assign as much greater inlets to this disgrace on the art of criticism, are such as admit of the easiest remedy in the world, a remedy in the power of critics themselves, and which their own interest loudly calls on them all to apply. The first cause is, that in a science the most fallible of all others, depending in a great measure on the tottering bottom of mere conjecture, almost every critic assumes the air of certainty, positiveness, and infallibility; he seems sure never to miss his way, though in a wilderness of confusion, never to stumble in a path always gloomy, and sometimes as dark as midnight. Hence he dogmatizes, when he should only propose, and dictates his guesses in the despotic style. The reader, and every rival editor, catches the same spirit, all his faults become unpardonable, and the demerit of a few mistakes shall overwhelm the merit of all his just emendations: He deems himself perfect, and perfection is demanded at his hands; and this being no where else found but by each writer in his own works, every putter-forth of two or three emendations swells as big, and flings his spittle as liberally on a Warburton, a Hanmer, or a Theobald, as if he |