University of Virginia Library

IV
Grammar: Alterations in Other Editions, and Emendations

Selecting as modifications of our first edition copy-text those substantive and accidental variants in the third and fourth editions of the Grammar assuredly or probably or possibly authorial has been the most difficult part of our textual responsibilities, and we are keenly aware that our choices sometimes rest on very slender evidence. On the other hand, detecting the certain or relative rightness of assorted competing variants in the first, second (unrevised), fifth (1784, unrevised), sixth (1785), and seventh (1785) editions presented fewer problems. Eight of the seventeen substantive selections from the first edition (all also in the fourth edition and five in the third) were replaced by incorrect readings in the second edition; another four names of works and authors and two names of works (all six also in the fourth edition) were reduced to authors' names; and three verbs were reduced from the plural (all also in the fourth edition) to the singular number. Of the fifty-four accidentals chosen from the first edition (thirty-two punctuation, eighteen spelling, one accent, one italics, one capitalization, and one the position of a sentence), we have judged twenty-six to be correct readings, twenty-eight preferable (usually owing to their certain or putative adherence to Johnson's copy-texts for quoted passages) to their alternatives.

Although unrevised, the second edition of the Grammar has supplied our text with (1) nine substantive readings—eight corrections of mistakes in the

first edition and an expansion of the initial "B." to "Ben" (sig. M1v), which also appears in the third and fourth editions; and (2) twenty accidentals, which correct a variety of slips. Likewise, the fifth edition has added four more correct readings—two substantive, two accidental—to our text. And our collation of the sixth edition has increased the number of correct readings by three—two substantive and one accidental. We found nothing more in the seventh edition.

Of the preliminaries to the unabridged (folio) Dictionary, only the Grammar appears in at least the first seven editions of the "proprietors'" abridged (octavo) version. Our collation showed that the first octavo edition (1756) of the Grammar was set from the first folio edition, the second octavo (1760) from the first, the third (1766) from the third folio edition, the fourth (1770) from the third octavo, the fifth (1773) from the fourth octavo, the sixth (1778) from the fourth folio edition, and the seventh (1783) from the sixth octavo. Our collation also revealed no signs of authorial revisions in any of the octavo editions of the Grammar.

Lastly, in the formation of our text, we have emended the text of the Grammar by altering three words. On sig. c2r, in the phrase "apex, a piece; peak, pike; zophorus, freese," "a piece" has been changed to "apice," which appears in John Wallis's Grammatica linguae Anglicanae (fourth edition 1674), from which Johnson drew the phrase and numerous other parts of his Grammar.[3] Also on sig. c2r, in the phrase "so in scapha [rightly "scapha" in the fifth edition], skiff, skip," "skip" has been changed to "ship," the proper translation, along with skiff, of the Latin scapha; ship also occurs, it should be noted, in Wallis's Grammar. Again on sig. c2r, in the phrase "and spell, a messenger, from epistola," "messenger" has been altered to "message," the correct translation of Wallis's "nuncium."

Neither in the Grammar nor in the History have we emended the passages—a great many in the History—which Johnson quotes from other writers. But wherever mistakes obstruct a reader's comprehension of the text we have supplied correct readings in our textual notes.