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Page 2
But, dear Sir, will you, at your leisure hours, think over for me
upon the contents, topics, orders, &c. of this branch of my labour?
You have a comprehensive memory, and a happiness of digesting the
matter joined to it, which my head is often too much embarrassed to
perform.... But how unreasonable is it to expect this labour, when
it is the only part in which I shall not be able to be just to my
friends: for, to confess assistance in a _Preface_ will, I am
afraid, make me appear too naked (John Nichols, _Illustrations
of the Literary History of the Eighteenth Century_, 1817, II,
621-22).
His next letter, which contains the list of acknowledgements
substantially as printed, thanks Warburton for consenting to give the
requested help, announces that he is himself busy about "the Contents...
wch. I am Endeavouring to modell in my Head, in Order to communicate
them to you, for your Directions & refinement," indicates that he has
"already rough-hewn the Exordium & Conclusion," and asserts that "What I
shall send you from Time to Time, I look upon only as Materials: wch I
hope may grow into a fine Building, under your judicious Management"
(Jones, _op. cit._, pp. 283-84).
Warburton apparently misunderstood or overlooked Theobald's remarks
about materials, for in his next letter Theobald was obliged to return,
somewhat ambiguously, to the same point:
I make no Question of my being wrong in the disjointed Parts
of my Preface, but my Intention was, (after I had given you the
Conclusion, & the Manner in wch. I meant to start) to give you a
List of all the other general Heads design'd to be handled, then to
transmit to you, at proper Leisure, my rough Working off of each
respective Head, that you might have the Trouble only of refining &
embellishing wth: additional Inrichments: of the general Arrangement,
wch. you should think best for the whole; & of making the proper
Transitions from Subject to Subject, wch. I account no inconsiderable
Beauty (_Ibid._, pp. 289-90).
Finally on January 10, 1733, Theobald wrote Warburton: "I promise myself
now shortly to sit down upon ye fine Synopsis, wch. you so modestly call
the Skeleton of Preface" (_Ibid._, p. 310).
It is clear from the foregoing that Theobald wrote most of the Preface
topic by topic, and probably followed the plan for the general structure
as submitted by Warburton. Yet it is equally clear that certain parts of
the Preface, such as the contrast between _Julius Caesar_ and Addison's
_Cato_, which Warburton later claimed as his and which Theobald omitted
from his second edition, were furnished Theobald as "additional
Inrichments" (D.N. Smith, _Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare_,
1903, pp. xlviii-ix). When later a break did occur between the two men,
neither was free from blame. Theobald had asked and got so much help
with the Preface that he should have acknowledged the debt, no matter
how naked it might have made him seem. Warburton, on the other hand, had
had honest warning that acknowledgement would not be made for this part
of his help; and if his synopsis were followed, as seems likely, his
condemnation of the Preface as "Theobald's heap of disjointed stuff" was
disingenuous, to say the least. Far less defensible was his assertion in
the same letter to Thomas Birch that, apart from the section on Greek
texts, virtually the entire Preface was stitched together from notes
which he had supplied (Nichols, _Illustrations_, II, 81).
Three further points concerning the Preface demand mention. First, the
section on Shakespeare's life is often dismissed as a simple recension
of Rowe's Life (1709). Actually, however, the expansion itself is a
characteristic example of Theobald's habit of exploring original
sources. To take only a single instance, Rowe says that Shakespeare's
"Family, as appears by the Register and Publick Writings relating to
that Town, were of good Figure and Fashion there, and are mention'd as
Gentlemen" (ed. S.H. Monk, Augustan Society Reprints, 1949, p. ii).
To this statement Theobald adds plentiful detail drawn from the same
Stratford records, from tombs in the Stratford Church, and from
documents in the Heralds' Office connected with the coat of arms
obtained for the playwright's father. Such typical expansions were
the result of conscientious research.
Second, all critics have agreed to condemn the digression in which
Theobald advertised his ability to emend Greek texts. Theobald himself
was hesitant about including it lest he be indicted for pedantry, but
was encouraged to do so by Warburton, who later scoffed at what he had
originally admired. This much may be said in Theobald's behalf. Such a
digression would not have seemed irrelevant in an age which took its
classical scholarship seriously; and such digressions, arising naturally
out of context and strategically placed before the conclusion, were not
only allowed but actually encouraged by classical rhetoricians like
Cicero and Quintilian, whose teachings were still standard in the
English schools.
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