A hundred years ago it was their rule to count the mss and trust the majority. But this pillow was snatched from under them by the great critics of the 19th century, and the truth that mss must be weighed, not counted, is now too widely known to be l ignored. The sluggard has lost his pillow, but he has kept his nature, and must needs find something else to 1011 on; so he fabricates, to suit the change of season, his precious precept of following one MS wherever possible. Engendered by infirmity and designed for comfort, no wonder if it misses the truth at which it was never aimed. Its aim was purely humanitarian: to rescue incompetent editors alike from the toil of editing and from the shame of acknowledging that they cannot edit.

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