Conjecture has all the joy and all the pride of invention, and he that has once started a happy change, is too much delighted to consider what objections may rise against it.
Yet conjectural criticism has been of great use in the learned world; nor is it my intention to depreciate a study, that has exercised so many mighty minds, from the revival of learning to our own age, from the Bishop of _Aleria_ to English _Bentley_.

The criticks on ancient authours have, in the exercise of their sagacity, many assistances, which the editor of _Shakespeare_ is condemned to want.

They are employed upon grammatical and settled languages, whose construction contributes so much to perspicuity, that _Homer_ has fewer passages unintelligible than _Chaucer_.

The words have not only a known regimen, but invariable quantities, which direct and confine the choice.

There are commonly more manuscripts than one; and they do not often conspire in the same mistakes.