No More Learning

Even _W_, which has a completer
version of some poems than _1633_, in these poems makes some mistakes
which _1633_ avoids.

If the manuscripts are to help us it must be by collating them, and
establishing what one might call the agreement of the manuscripts
whether universal or partial, noting in the latter case the
comparative value of the different groups. When we do this we get at
once an interesting result. We find that in about nine cases out of
ten the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of those readings
of _1633_ which are supported by the tests of intrinsic probability
referred to above,[42] and on the other hand we find that sometimes
the agreement of the manuscripts is on the side of the later editions,
and that in such cases there is a good deal to be said for the later
reading. [43]

The first result of a collation of the manuscripts is thus to
vindicate _1633_, and to provide us with a means of distinguishing
among later variants those which have, from those which have not,
authority. But in vindicating _1633_ the agreement of the manuscripts
vindicates itself. If _B_'s evidence is found always or most often to
support _A_, a good witness, on those points on which _A_'s evidence
is in itself most probably correct, not only is _A_'s evidence
strengthened but _B_'s own character as a witness is established, and
he may be called in when _A_, followed by _C_, an inferior witness,
has gone astray. In some cases the manuscripts _alone_ give us what
is obviously the correct reading, e. g. p. 25, l. 22, 'But wee no more'
for 'But now no more'; p. 72, l. 26, 'his first minute' for 'his short
minute'. These are exceptionally clear cases.
There are some where, I
have no doubt, my preference of the reading of the manuscripts to that
of the editions will not be approved by every reader. I have adopted
no rigid rule, but considered each case on its merits. All the
circumstances already referred to have to be weighed--which reading
is most likely to have arisen from the other, what is Donne's usage
elsewhere, what Scholastic or other 'metaphysical' dogma underlies the
conceit, and what is the source of the text of a particular poem in
_1633_.

For my analysis of this edition has thrown light upon what of itself
is evident--that of some poems or groups of poems _1633_ provides a
more accurate text than of others, viz. of those for which its source
was a manuscript resembling _D_, _H49_, _Lec_, but possibly more
correct than any one of these, or revised by an editor who knew the
poems. But in printing some of the poems, e. g. _The Progresse of the
Soule_, a number of the letters to noble ladies and others,[44] the
_Epithalamion made at Lincolns Inne_, _The Prohibition_, and a few
others, for which _D_, _H49_, _Lec_ was not available, _1633_ seems
to have followed an inferior manuscript, _A18_, _N_, _TC_ or one
resembling it. In these cases it is possible to correct _1633_ by
comparing it with a better single manuscript, as _G_ or _W_, or group
of manuscripts, as _D_, _H49_, _Lec_. Sometimes even a generally
inferior manuscript like _O'F_ seems to offer a better text of an
individual poem, at least in parts, for occasionally the correct
reading has been preserved in only one or two manuscripts. Only _W_
among eleven manuscripts which I have recorded (and I have examined
others) preserves the reading in the _Epithalamion made at Lincolns
Inne_, p. 143, l. 57:

His steeds nill be restrain'd

--which is quite certainly right. Only three manuscripts have the, to
my mind, most probably correct reading in _Satyre I_, l. 58, p. 147:

The Infanta of London;

and only two, _Q_ and the _Dyce MS.