No More Learning

It has
been an advantage to me in this part of the work to come after Mr.
Chambers and the Grolier Club editors, but neither of these editions
records changes of punctuation.

The second purpose of the notes is to set forth the evidence of the
manuscripts. I have not attempted to give anything like a full account
of the variant readings of these, but have recorded so much as is
sufficient for four different purposes.

(1) To vindicate the text of 1633. I have not thought it necessary
to detail the evidence in cases where no one has disputed the 1633
reading. If the note simply records the readings of the editions it
may be assumed that the manuscript evidence, so far as it is explicit
(the manuscripts frequently abound in absurd errors), is on the side
of 1633. In other cases, when there is something to be said for the
text of the later editions, and especially when modern editors have
preferred the later reading (though I have not always called attention
to this) I have set forth the evidence in some detail. At times I
have mentioned each manuscript, at others simply _all the MSS. _,
occasionally just _MSS. _ This last means generally that all the
positive evidence before me was in favour of the reading, but that my
collations were silent as to some of the manuscripts. My collators,
whether myself or those who worked for me, used Mr. Chambers' edition
because of its numbered lines. Now if Mr. Chambers had already adopted
a 1635 or later reading the tendency of the collator--especially
at first, before the importance of certain readings had become
obvious--was to pass over the agreement of the manuscript with this
later reading in silence.
In all important cases I have verified
the reading by repeated reference to the manuscripts, but in some of
smaller importance I have been content to record the general trend of
the evidence. I have tried to cite no manuscript unless I had positive
evidence as to its reading.

(2) The second use which I have made of the manuscript evidence is
to justify my occasional departures from the text of the editions,
whether 1633 (and these are the departures which call for most
justification) or whatever later edition was the first to contain the
poem. In every such case the reader should see at a glance what was
the reading of the first edition, and on what authority it has been
altered. My aim has been a true text (so far as that was attainable),
not a reprint; but I have endeavoured to put the reader in exactly
the same position as I was myself at each stage in the construction of
that text. If I have erred, he can (in a favourite phrase of Donne's)
'control' me. This applies to spelling and punctuation as well as to
the words themselves. But two warnings are necessary. When I note a
reading as found in a number of editions, e. g. 1635 to 1654 (1635-54),
or in _all_ the editions (1633-69), it must be understood that the
spelling is not always the same throughout. I have generally noted
any variation in the use of capitals, but not always. The spelling and
punctuation of each poem is that of the _first_ edition in which it
was published, or of the manuscript from which I have printed, all
changes being recorded. Again, if, in a case where the words and not
the punctuation is the matter in question, I cite the reading of an
edition or some editions followed by a list of agreeing manuscripts,
it will be understood that any punctuation given is that of the
editions. If a list of manuscripts only is given, the punctuation, if
recorded, is that of one or two of the best of these.

In cases where punctuation is the matter in question the issue lies
between the various editions and my own sense of what it ought to be.