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ΤΟ

MY DEAR WIFE,

IN GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENT

OF HER

SYMPATHETIC CRITICISM

AND

KINDLY AID,

I LOVINGLY INSCRIBE

THIS EDITION.

PREFACE

66

IN this volume of selections from the Spectator, the text of Tickell's (1721) edition of Addison's works has been compared with Henry Morley's (1888) new edition of the Spectator, "reproducing the original text, both as first issued, and as corrected by its authors." In each instance the text has been given as corrected; " but it has not been thought best to give an exact reprint of spelling, capitals, and punctuation. As it is the aim of secondary teachers to make their pupils familiar with the best modern usage, and as some pupils are prone to misspell, mispunctuate, and miscapitalize in spite of both precept and example, it seems wise to sacrifice a bookish sentiment to utilitarian ends.

As to Addison's grammar, while his principal departures from modern idioms have been noted, the sacrilege of paraphrasing has been studiously avoided. Here and there the papers have been slightly edited for obvious reasons. The Partridge hoax has been purposely treated at considerable length in the Introduction, not only because it is famous in literature, has a direct bearing upon the inception of the Tatler, and is most amusing in itself, but also because it gives an interesting glimpse of one of the most famous contemporaries of Steele and Addison-Dean Swift.

The chronological table has been made a little fuller than in other books of this series, in the thought that some may become interested in the lives of the two principal characters and wish to follow them up in detail. After a brief course of reading in some of the books suggested under BIBLIOGRAPHY (p. xlv.), the student might be re

quired to write a sketch of Addison or Steele, using as a "brief" the chronological table.

My thanks are especially due to Prof. G. R. Carpenter, the general editor of the series, for his scholarly criticisms of this edition while it has been passing through the press, and for the courtesy with which he has pointed out infelicities and inaccuracies that would otherwise have escaped my notice.

ROXBURY LATIN SCHOOL, May, 1896.

D. O. S. L.

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