The figures are not editorial. If you look at the facsimiles of Corelli's published opuses (opera?) you'll see that they're all heavily figured.
You are not generally required to play ALL the figures, they're just to let you what's happening above. Of course it usually sounds great in Corelli to grab all the suspensions you can, but it works just as well to have the other parts clash against you. One caveat: there are places where a dissonance is set up in the upper voice and not resolved. In this case it's usually good to double the dissonance and resolve it properly. This almost never happens in Corelli, though, as his voice leading is superb. One last thing: they're not really ninth chords like Chuck Berry, in that they don't have a seventh in them and they don't have dominant function. They're just triads in which the octave of the bass is delayed. That's why it's okay to leave it out. On the other hand, since 7 often (Not always) resolves to 6, in this case you really shouldn't play a triad as it never sounds good. If you can't do the 7-6, just play a third above the base. CW To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
