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From the time it was recognized as a distinct variant, now almost a century ago, the "Coppies" issue of Shakespeare's Second Folio has been gradually received and accepted as the predecessor of a certain sequence of titles in several states and settings, and thus the first to represent, on the leaf conjugate to the title, the earliest issue of Milton's first-printed English poem. Such, in brief, is the account of an issue considered only as a freak in the days of Lowndes and Bohn, then regarded as "one of the earliest impressions" by Lenox, Winsor, Cole, and Pollard, and finally accorded preeminence over all in the exhaustive study published by Robert Metcalf Smith.[1]
When confronted by this imposing array of "firsts," in point of issue for book and poem, in two great names now conjoined in a single text, and in the roster of scholars who have labored to establish and justify the present hypothesis, it ill becomes an upstart to trample upon the work of generations and subvert the tradition that work has produced. And yet, if the facts of printing invalidate critical theories, it is the bibliographer's unbecoming duty to present them. Certainly the facts allow us to accept the premise common to all discussions of the problem: We are indeed concerned with several issues of the Second Folio, each conveying a different setting of Milton's Epitaph on Shakespeare. Beyond this, however, I must demur and eventually dismiss all contentions as irrelevant.[2]
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