course must be corrupted; and thence the
Reader's betray'd into a false Meaning.

If the _Latin_ and _Greek_ Languages have receiv'd the greatest Advantages
imaginable from the Labours of the Editors and Criticks of the two last
Ages; by whose Aid and Assistance the Grammarians have been enabled to
write infinitely better in that Art than even the preceding Grammarians,
who wrote when those Tongues flourish'd as living Languages: I should
account it a peculiar Happiness, that, by the faint Assay I have made in
this Work, a Path might be chalk'd out, for abler Hands, by which to
derive the same Advantages to our own Tongue: a Tongue, which, tho' it
wants none of the fundamental Qualities of an universal Language, yet, as
a _noble Writer_ says, lisps and stammers as in its Cradle; and has
produced little more towards its polishing than Complaints of its
Barbarity.

Having now run thro' all those Points which I intended should make any
Part of this Dissertation, and having in my _former_ Edition made publick
Acknowledgments of the Assistances lent me, I shall conclude with a brief
Account of the Methods taken in _This_.

It was thought proper, in order to reduce the Bulk and Price of the
Impression, that the Notes, where-ever they would admit of it, might be
abridg'd: for which Reason I have curtail'd a great Quantity of Such, in
which Explanations were too prolix, or Authorities in Support of an
Emendation too numerous: and Many I have entirely expung'd, which were
judg'd rather Verbose and Declamatory (and, so, Notes merely of
Ostentation), than necessary or instructive.

The few literal Errors which had escap'd Notice, for want of Revisals, in
the former Edition, are here reform'd: and the Pointing of innumerable
Passages is regulated, with all the Accuracy I am capable of.

I shall decline making any farther Declaration of the Pains I have taken
upon my Author, because it was my Duty, as his Editor, to publish him with
my best Care and Judgment: and because I am sensible, all such
Declarations are construed to be laying a sort of a Debt on the Publick.
As the former Edition has been received with much Indulgence, I ought to
make my Acknowledgments to the Town for their favourable Opinion of it:
and I shall always be proud to think That Encouragement the best Payment I
can hope to receive from my poor Studies.

SIR THOMAS HANMER: PREFACE TO EDITION OF SHAKESPEARE. 1744.

What the Publick is here to expe