In 1744, a new edition of Shakespeare's Works, in six volumes, 4to, was published at Oxford. It appeared with a kind of sanction from the University, as it was printed at the Theatre, with the Imprimatur of the Vice-Chancellor, and had no publisher's name on the title-page. The Editor is not named--hence he is frequently referred to by subsequent critics as 'the Oxford Editor';--but as he was well known to be Sir Thomas Hanmer, we have always referred to the book under his name. We read in the preface: 'What the Publick is here to expect is a true and correct Edition of Shakespear's Works, cleared from the corruptions with which they have hitherto abounded. One of the great admirers of this incomparable author hath made it the amusement of his leisure hours for many years past to look over his writings with a careful eye, to note the obscurities and absurdities introduced into the text, and according to the best of his judgment to restore the genuine sense and purity of it. In this he proposed nothing to himself but his private satisfaction in making his own copy as perfect as he could; but as the emendations multiplied upon his hands, other Gentlemen equally fond of the Author, desired to see them, and some were so kind as to give their assistance by communicating their observations and conjectures upon difficult passages which had occurred to them.' From this passage the character of the edition may be inferred. A country gentleman of great ingenuity and lively fancy, but with no knowledge of older literature, no taste for research, and no ear for the rhythm of earlier English verse, amused his leisure hours by scribbling down his own and his friends' guesses in Pope's Shakespeare, and with this _apparatus criticus_, if we may believe Warburton, 'when that illustrious body, the University of Oxford, in their public capacity, undertook an edition of Shakespeare by subscription,' Sir T. Hanmer 'thrust himself into the employment.' Whether from the sanction thus given, or from its typographical beauty, or from the plausibility of its new readings, this edition continued in favour, and even 'rose to the price of 10_l._ 10_s._ before it was reprinted in 1770-1, while Pope's, in quarto, at the same period sold off at Tonson's sale for 16_s._ per copy.' Bohn, p. 2260. In 1747, three years after Pope's death, another edition of Shakespeare based upon his appeared, edited by Mr Warburton. On the title-page are these words: 'The Genuine Text (collated with all the former Editions, and then corrected and emended) is here settled: Being restored from the _Blunders_ of the first Editors, and the _Interpolations_ of the two Last: with a Comment and Notes, Critical and Explanatory. By Mr Pope and Mr Warburton[9].'