Page:The Plays of William Shakspeare (1778).djvu/67

Rh obolete papers, perued commonly with ome other view. Of this knowledge every man has ome, and none has much; but when an author has engaged the publick attention, thoe who can add any thing to his illutration, communicate their dicoveries, and time produces what had eluded diligence.

To time I have been obliged to reign many paeges, which, though I did not undertand them, will perhaps hereafter be explained, having, I hope, illutrated ome, which others have neglected or mitaken, ometimes by hort remarks, or marginal directions, uch as every editor has added at his will, and often by comments more laborious than the matter will eem to deerve; but that which is mot difficult is not always mot important, and to an editor nothing is a trifle by which his author is obcured.

The poetical beauties or defects I have not been very diligent to oberve. Some plays have more, and ome fewer judicial obervations, not in proportion to their difference of merit, but becaue I gave this part of my deign to chance and to caprice. The reader, I believe, is eldom pleaed to find his opinion anticipated; it is natural to delight more in what we find or make, than in what we receive. Judgment, like other faculties, is improved by practice, and its advancement is hindered by ubmiion to dictatorial deciions, as the memory grows torpid by the ue of a table-book. Some initiation is however neceary; of all kill, part is infued by precept, and part is obtained by habit; I have therefore hewn o much Rh