It is not with any secret Pleasure, that I so frequently animadvert on Mr. _Pope_ as a Critick; but there are Provocations, which a Man can never quite forget. His Libels have been thrown out with so much Inveteracy, that, not to dispute whether they _should_ come from a _Christian_, they leave it a Question whether they _could_ come from a _Man_. I should be loth to doubt, as _Quintus Serenus_ did in a like Case, Sive homo, seu similis turpissima bestia nobis, Vulnera dente dedit. The Indignation, perhaps, for being represented a _Blockhead_, may be as strong in Us as it is in the Ladies for a Reflexion on their _Beauties_. It is certain, I am indebted to Him for some _flagrant Civilities_; and I shall willingly devote a part of my Life to the honest Endeavour of quitting Scores: with this Exception however, that I will not return those Civilities in his _peculiar_ Strain, but confine myself, at lead, to the Limits of _common Decency_. I shall ever think it better to want _Wit_, than to want _Humanity_: and impartial Posterity may, perhaps, be of my Opinion. [Sidenote: The old Editions faulty, whence.] But, to return to my Subject; which now calls upon me to inquire into those Causes, to which the Depravations of my Author originally may be assign’d. We are to consider him as a Writer, of whom no authentic Manuscript was extant; as a Writer, whose Pieces were dispersedly perform’d on the several _Stages_ then in Being. And it was the Custom of those Days for the Poets to take a Price of the _Players_ for the Pieces They from time to time furnish’d; and thereupon it was suppos’d, they had no farther Right to print them without the Consent of the _Players_. As it was the Interest of the _Companies_ to keep their Plays unpublish’d, when any one succeeded, there was a Contest betwixt the Curiosity of the Town, who demanded to see it in Print, and the Policy of the _Stagers_, who wish’d to secrete it within their own Walls. Hence, many 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.