have censured him for Confusion of Ideas
and Inaccuracy of reasoning. _In the Neighing of a Horse (__SAYS__ Rymer),
or in the Growling of a Mastiff, there is a Meaning, there is a lively
Expression, and, may I say, more Humanity than many times in the tragical
Flights of __SHAKESPEAR__._ The Ignorance of which Censure is of a Piece
with its Brutality. The Truth is, no one thought clearer, or argued more
closely than this immortal Bard. But his Superiority of Genius less
needing the Intervention of Words in the Act of Thinking, when he came to
draw out his Contemplations into Discourse, he took up (as he was hurried
on by the Torrent of his Matter) with the first Words that lay in his Way;
and if, amongst these, there were two _Mixed-modes_ that had but a
principal Idea in common, it was enough for him; he regarded them as
synonymous, and would use the one for the other without Fear or
Scruple.--Again, there have been others, such as the two last Editors, who
have fallen into a contrary Extreme, and regarded _Shakespear_'s Anomalies
(as we may call them) amongst the Corruptions of his Text; which,
therefore, they have cashiered in great Numbers, to make room for a Jargon
of their own. This hath put me to additional Trouble; for I had not only
their Interpolations to throw out again, but the genuine Text to replace,
and establish in its stead; which, in many Cases, could not be done
without shewing the peculiar Sense of the Terms, and explaining the Causes
which led the Poet to so perverse a use of them. I had it once, indeed, in
my Design, to give a general alphabetic _Glossary_ of these Terms; but as
each of them is explained in its proper Place, there seemed the less
Occasion for such an Index.

2. The Poet's hard and unnatural Construction had a different Original.
This was the Effect of mistaken Art and Design. The Public Taste was in
its Infancy; and delighted (as it always does during that State) in the
high and turgid; which leads the Writer to disguise a vulgar expression
with hard and forced construction, whereby the Sentence frequently becomes
cloudy and dark. Here, his Critics shew their modesty, and leave him to
himself. For the arbitrary change of a Word doth little towards dispelling
an obscurity that ariseth, not from the licentious use of a single Term,
but from the unnatural arrangement of a whole Sentence. And they risqued
nothing by their silence. For _Shakespear_ was too clear in Fame to be
suspected o