29 From a letter to Richard West, written apparently in 1742: see
_Works_, ed. Gosse, ii., p. 109.
30 Richardson believed that the greatest blemishes in Shakespeare
“proceeded from his want of consummate taste.” The same idea had
been expressed more forcibly by Hume in his Appendix to the Reign of
James I.: “His total ignorance of all theatrical art and conduct,
however material a defect, yet, as it affects the spectator rather
than the reader, we can more easily excuse than that want of taste
which often prevails in his productions, and which gives way only by
intervals to the irradiations of genius.” Hugh Blair, whose name is
associated with the Edinburgh edition of 1753, had said in his
lectures on rhetoric in the University of Edinburgh that Shakespeare
was “deficient in just taste, and altogether unassisted by knowledge
or art.” And Adam Smith believed so strongly in the French doctrines
that Wordsworth could call him “the worst critic, David Hume not
excepted, that Scotland, a soil to which this sort of weed seems
natural, has produced.” Kames, however, was a Scot.
31 Hazlitt confounds Whately with George Mason, author of _An Essay on
Design in Gardening_, 1768. Whately’s book was published as “by the
author of _Observations on Modern Gardening_.” His name was given in
the second edition, 1808.
J. P. Kemble replied to Whately’s _Remarks_ in _Macbeth
re-considered_ (1786; republished in 1817 with the title _Macbeth
and King Richard the Third_).
32 Morgann’s kinship with the romantic critics is seen even in so minor
a matter as his criticism of Johnson; see p. 248.
33 Essay on “The Person of Shakspearian Criticism,” _Essays and
Studies_, 1895, p. 270.
34 I am indebted to Dr. Aldis Wright for procuring for me the details
of Warburton’s claims. As a few of the passages were omitted by
Theobald in the second edition, the following page references are to
the edition of 1733:
(1) P. xix, _This Similitude_, to _Nature and Science_, p. xx.
(2) P. xxi, _Servetur ad imum_, to _the more wonder’d at_, p. xxii.
(3) P. xxv, _That nice Critick_, to _Truth and Nature_, p. xxvii.
(4) P. xxx, _For I shall find_, to _this long agitated Question_, p.
xxxii. (p. 76).
(5) P. xxxiii, _They are confessedly_, to _Force and Splendor_, p.
xxxiv. (p. 77).
(6) P. xxxiv, _And how great that Merit_, to _ill Appearance_ (p.
77).
(7) P. xxxv, _It seems a moot Point_, to _from the spurious_, p.
xxxvi. (p. 78).
(8) P. xxxix, _For the late Edition_, to _have wrote so_, p. xl. (p.
81).
(9) P. xl, _The Science of Criticism_, to _Editor’s Labour_, p. xli.
(pp. 81, 82).
(10) P. xlv, _There are Obscurities_, to _antiquated and disused_
(p. 84).
(11) P. xlvi, _Wit lying mostly_, to _Variety of his Ideas_, p.
xlvii. (pp. 84-86).
(12) P. xlviii, _as to Rymer_, to _his best Reflexions_ (p. 86).
(13) P. lxii, _If the Latin_, to _Complaints of its Barbarity_ (pp.
89, 90).
The passages which were retained are printed in the present text at
the pages indicated above within brackets. Cf. Notes, p. 89.
35 Mr. Lounsbury has said that Hanmer’s authorship of this pamphlet “is
so improbable that it may be called impossible. The sentiments
expressed in it are not Hanmer’s sentiments” (_Shakespeare as a
Dramatic Artist_, p. 60). But he has omitted to tell us how he knows
what Hanmer’s sentiments are.
_ 36 Ld._ Falkland, _Ld. C. J._ Vaughan, _and Mr._ Selden.