y Pieces were
taken down in Short-hand, and imperfectly copied by Ear, from
a _Representation_: Others were printed from piece-meal Parts,
surreptitiously obtain'd from the Theatres, uncorrect, and without
the Poet's Knowledge. To some of these Causes we owe the train of
Blemishes, that deform those Pieces which stole singly into the
World in our Author's Life-time.

There are still other Reasons, which may be suppos'd to have
affected the whole Set. When the _Players_ took upon them to publish
his Works intire, every Theatre was ransack'd to supply the Copy;
and _Parts_ collected which had gone thro' as many Changes as
Performers, either from Mutilations or Additions made to them. Hence
we derive many Chasms and Incoherences in the Sense and Matter.
Scenes were frequently transposed, and shuffled out of their true
Place, to humour the Caprice or suppos'd Convenience of some
particular Actor. Hence much Confusion and Impropriety has attended,
and embarras'd, the Business and Fable. For there ever have been,
and ever will be in Playhouses, a Set of assuming Directors, who
know better than the Poet himself the Connexion and Dependance of
his Scenes; where Matter is defective, or Superfluities to be
retrench'd; Persons, that have the Fountain of _Inspiration_ as
peremptorily in them, as Kings have That of _Honour_. To these
obvious Causes of Corruption it must be added, that our Author has
lain under the Disadvantage of having his Errors propagated and
multiplied by Time: because, for near a Century; his Works were
republish'd from the faulty Copies without the assistance of any
intelligent Editor: which has been the Case likewise of many a
_Classic_ Writer.

[Sidenote: The Editor's Drift and Method.]

[Sidenote*: Difference betwixt this Edition and Dr. _Bentley_'s
_Milton_.]

The Nature of any Distemper once found has generally been the
immediate Step to a Cure. _Shakespeare_'s Case has in a great
Measure resembled That of a corrupt _Classic_; and, consequently,
the Method of Cure was likewise to bear a Resemblance. By what
Means, and with what Success, this Cure has been effected on ancient
Writers, is too well known, and needs no formal Illustration. The
Reputation consequent on Tasks of that Nature invited me to attempt
the Method here; with this View, the Hopes of restoring to the
Publick their greatest Poet in his Original Purity: after having so
long lain in a Condition that was a Disgrace to comm