[CRUiKSHAN-K] PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 11 



to the person or nation concerned. Jared Sparks was a notable 

 offender in this respect. 



The writer may have expressed himself vaguely or obscurely, or 

 made use of words in a different sense from that in which they are 

 now understood. 



The evidence of the documents available is often conflicting, 

 contradictory, or defective. Important documents may have been 

 destroyed, mutilated, or lost sight of. Of many important negotia- 

 tions and transactions no written record was preserved. Metternich 

 relates in his Memoirs that at the Congress of Vienna "the most 

 difficult affairs and the arrangements most complicated in their 

 nature were, so to speak, negotiated from room to room, no sending 

 of couriers, no written negotiation, no medium between the courts; 

 all these things, so necessary in ordinary times, had disappeared . . . 

 the courts concerned are without any written accounts of the most 

 important negotiations." 



Even the waste-paper baskets were carefully examined and their 

 contents destroyed lest they should inadvertently reveal the secrets 

 of the diplomats. 



It is understood that the same practice prev'ailed to a great extent 

 at the recent Conference of Versailles. 



An eminent writer on the contemporary histor^^ of the United 

 States says that the chronicle of the frauds connected with the manip- 

 ulation of land grants to railways and the shameless sale of legal 

 privileges cannot be written, because in most instances, no tangible 

 records have been left."' 



Contradictions and discrepancies abound everywhere in the 

 written records. These may be largely ascribed to the individual 

 point of view, or to the character or temperament of the writers. 



The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table said that there were at 

 least six personalities involved in a dialogue between any two in- 

 dividuals; for instance with respect to John and Thomas, there were: 

 Three Johns — 1. The real John, known only to his Maker. 



2. John's ideal John; never the real one, and often 

 very unlike him. 



3. Thomas's ideal John; never the real John, nor 

 John's John, and often very unlike either. 



Three Thomases — ^1. The real Thomas. 



2. Thomas's ideal Thomas. 



3. John's ideal Thomas. 



' Beard: Contemporary American History, p. 31. 



