’ TS es eae fe ern eee 
Me J > ¥ ®, 
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‘ ll 
g6 OF THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING. [Il. 10, 
memorable were but tolerably reported as they pass, the 
compiling of a complete history of times mought be the 
better expected, when a writer should arise that were fit 
for it: for the collection of such relations mought be 
as a nursery garden, whereby to plant a fair and stately 
garden, when time should serve. 
11. There is yet another partition of history which 
Cornelius Tacitus maketh, which is not to be forgotten, 
specially with that application which he accoupleth it 
withal, annals and journals: appropriating to the former 
matters of estate, and to the latter acts and accidents of a 
meaner nature. For giving but a touch of certain mag- 
nificent buildings, he addeth, Cum ex dignitate populi Ro- 
mani repertum sit, res wlustres annalibus, talia diurnis urbis 
actis mandare. So as there is a kind of contemplative 
heraldry, as well as civil. And as nothing doth derogate 
from the dignity of a state more than confusion of de- 
grees, so it doth not a little imbase the authority of an 
history, to intermingle matters of triumph, or matters of 
ceremony, or matters of novelty, with matters of state. 
But the use of a journal hath not only been in the history 
of time, but likewise in the history of persons, and chiefly 
of actions; for princes in ancient time had, upon point 
of honour and policy both, journals kept, what passed 
day by day. For we see the chronicle which was read 
before Ahasuerus, when he could not take rest, contained 
matter of affairs indeed, but such as had passed in his 
own time and very lately before. But the journal of 
Alexander’s house expressed every small particularity, 
even concerning his person and court; and it is yet 
an use well received in enterprises memorable, as expe- 
ditions of war, navigations, and the like, to keep diaries 
of that which passeth continually. 
