From the author's preface: "I am not aware that the attempt made in this small volume has been anticipated in any other. Even the notes of critics upon Shakespeare, superfluously full in pointing out his obligations, real or supposed, to secular authors, are singularly meagre in the references which they make to the Holy Scriptures. And yet how abundant is the room for such reference, and how much it may conduce to the mutual illustration of the two books, which as Christians and as Britons we should value most, will be seen, I trust, upon every page of the Second Part of the following dissertation." A reprint of the third edition of 1880, by Charles Wordsworth, then the Bishop of St. Andrews and Fellow of Winchester College.