ABSTRACT
Texts degenerate in accordance with certain laws. A great deal of pains has been taken to discover and classify the causes and the ordinary forms of the differences which are observed between originals and copies; and hence rules have been deduced which may be applied to the conjectural restoration of those passages in a unique copy of a lost original which are certainly corrupt, or are so in all probability. The most satisfactory are those whose correctness is obvious palaeographically, as is the case with the classical emendation by J. N. Madvig of the text of Seneca’s Letters. Some works are preserved in hundreds of copies all differing from each other; sometimes the variants of a text of quite moderate extent arc to be counted by thousands; several years of assiduous labour are necessary for the preparation of a critical edition of some medieval romances.
