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fits of historical reading as a necessary department of education, or a profitable employment of leisure hours, have been very much exaggerated. It may, indeed, do no harm, for the same reason that it does no good, viz. because it takes no hold; it glides away like globules of crude quicksilver over a smooth surface, or at most is deposited in the shewroom of the memory:-because no conclusions, applicable to common life, can be drawn from it; because it excites no sense of reality. It is gone through as a task,—by children on compulsion, by young people as a merit. The most remarkable thing about your history-reading young ladies, is the self-satisfaction with which they turn over the pages; and in truth, they might be doing much worse, but might they not also be doing much better? To make this sort of reading available for any purpose, requires very deep and wide research, and harder thinking than we would gladly see young brows furrowed withal; for not one man in a thousand, not one woman in a million, is called on to make any use of their politic wisdom when they have got it, and nothing is more likely to delude and puzzle simple persons in the exercise of their political rights, than a superficial acquaintance with the heads of history. But this same politic wisdom itself, even when genuine, and not a puffed conceit, is one of the most unwholesome fruits of the tree of knowledge, and if the mind be not fortified with good and sufficient antidotes, is a moral poison. Why is the "murderous Machiavél” a bye word of abhorrence? Whence is it, that while the bloody deeds of conquerors shine fair in story and in song, as the wounds of the Faithful in Moslem Paradise, the master-strokes of the subtle politicians, of the Richelieus and Bedomars, only appear as letters of sulphurous flame, writing their own condemnation? Because the heart of man gives honour to bravery, which is nature's gift, but has no respect for the wisdom which grows of experience in evil ways. Now the study of history in books can give only the same kind of knowledge, and the same habits of mind, as men long versed in public affairs gain by actual experience; the impression will, indeed, be much fainter, the effect for good or ill much less potent, but it is the same as far as it goes. It is like the knowledge of the world acquired by keeping bad company. Now the study of Biography has at least this advantage, that it enables the student to select his companions. If he

chooses Colonel Jack, or Moll Flanders, it is his own fault. But history not only continually exhibits the doings of bad men, but it exhibits only the bad, or at any rate the worse, acts of good ones: for most men are better in their private than in their public relations.

Frail and corrupt as human nature is, it is by no means so hateful, so utterly forsaken of Heaven, as the transactions of kingdoms and republics (there is little difference between the two) would incline us to think. The best part, even of the most conspicuous characters, is that which makes the least shew and the least noise. And after all, the history of nations is only the history of a small portion of the life of a very few men.

We cannot be supposed to censure the study of history: we only wish it to be properly balanced by studies which tend to keep the eye of man upon his own heart, upon the sphere of his immediate duties, of those duties, where his affections are to be exercised and regulated, and which, considering man as a person, consider him as sentient, intelligent, moral, and immortal. For simply to think of a man as a sentient being, is incon, sistent with that hard-hearted policy which would employ him, reckless of his suffering or enjoyment, like a wedge or a rivet, to build up the idol temple of a false national greatness; to regard him as intelligent, or rather as capable of intelligence, condemns the system that would keep him in ignorance to serve the purposes of his rulers, as game cocks are penned up in the dark that they may fight the better; to regard him as moral, corrects the primary conception of national prosperity; and to revere him as immortal, commands peremptorily that he shall never be made a tool or instrument to any end in which his own permanent welfare is not included.

It is in all these capacities that the biographer considers his subjects. He speaks of actions, not as mere links in the concatenation of events, but as the issues of a responsible will. He endeavours to place himself at the exact point, in relation to general objects, in which his subject was placed, and to see things as he saw them-not, indeed, neglecting to avail himself of the vantage ground which time or circumstances may have given him to correct what was delusive in the partial aspect, but never forgetting, while he exposes the error, to explain its cause.

The work to which these remarks are prefixed is purely biographical.

It professes no more than to introduce the reader to an acquaintance with the several Worthies that may drop in upon him during the course of publication. As it will comprise characters in every profession, of all parties, and many religious denominations, the author cannot in all cases undertake to decide upon the professional merits of those whose lives he has endeavoured to depict; or to criticise purely professional works, such as relate to physic, engineering, &c.; but will faithfully detail the judgments which have obtained public credit. As to matters of opinion, whether political or religious, his rule has been, to make each speak for himself in his own words, or by his own actions, taking care, as far as possible, to represent the opinions that men or sects have actually held, in the light in which they have been held by their professors not in the distorted perspective of their adversaries. He enters into no engagement to withhold his own.sentiments; but he will not judge, much less condemn, the sentiments of others.

A work of this nature necessarily borrows much, but wherever original matter was attainable, it has been gladly used, and in the proper place, thankfully acknowledged. And so far we have discharged our duty as chairman to the combined meeting of the great Counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. H. C.

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