IT hath been no custom in me of all other men (courteous readers) to commit my plays to the press; the reason though some may attribute to my own insufficiency, I had rather subscribe, in that, to their severe censure, than by seeking to avoid the imputation of weakness, to incur greater suspicion of honesty: for, though some have used a double sale of their labours, first to the stage, and after to the press, for my own part I here proclaim myself ever faithful in the first, and never guilty of the last. Yet since some of my plays have (unknown to me, and without any of my direction) accidentally come into the printer’s hands, and therefore so corrupt and mangled (copied only by the ear) that I have been as unable to know them as ashamed to challenge them, this therefore I was the willinger to furnish out in his native habit: first being by consent; next because the rest have been so wronged, in being published in such savage and ragged ornaments. Accept it, courteous gentlemen, and prove as favourable readers as we have found you gracious auditors.
Yours, T. H.