THE DRAMATICK WRITINGS OF a WILL. SHAK SPERE, With the Notes of all the various Commentators; PRINTED COMPLETE FROM THE BEST EDITIONS OF SAM. JOHNSON and GEO. STEEVENS. Wolume the Fourteenth. CONTAINING KING HENRY VI. Part 3. LONDON: Printed for, and under the Direction of, M DCC LXXXVIII. HENRY VI PART III. BY WILL. SHAKSPERE: Printed Complete from the TEXT of SAM. JOHNSON and GEO. STEEVENS, And revised from the last Editions. When Learning's triumph o'er her barb'rous foes DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON. LONDON: Printed for, and under the direction of, JOHN BELL, British-Library, STRAND, Bookseller to His Royal Highness the PRINCE of WALES: MDCCLXXXVI, 7-11-41 MER OBSERVATIONS ON THE Fable AND, Composition OF THE THIRD PART OF HENRY VI THB action of this play (which was at first printed under this title, The true Tragedy of Richard Duke of York, and the good King Henry the Sixth; or, The Second Part of the Contention of York and Lancaster) opens just after the first battle at Saint Alban's, wherein the York faction carried the day; and closes with the murder of king Henry VI. and the birth of prince Edward, afterwards king Edward V. So that this history takes in the space of full sixteen years. THEOBALD. The present historical drama was altered by Crowne, and brought on the stage in the year 1680, under the title of The Miseries of Civil War. Surely the works of Shakspere could have been little read at that period; for Crowne in his prologue, declares the play to be entirely his own composition: "For by his feeble skill 'tis built alone, "The divine Shakspere did not lay one stone;", |