ROBERTSON. 301 



templating successful courage or skill, whensoever these 

 are directed towards the injury of mankind ; to call 

 forth our scorn of perfidious actions, however successful ; 

 our detestation of cruel and bloodthirsty propensities, 

 however powerful the talents by which their indul- 

 gence was secured. Instead of holding up to our 

 admiration the " pride, pomp, and circumstance of 

 glorious war," it is the historian's duty to make 

 us regard with unceasing delight the ease, worth, and 

 happiness of blessed peace ; he must remember that 



" Peace hath her victories, 

 No less renown'd than War :"* 



and to celebrate these triumphs, the progress of science 

 and of art, the extension and security of freedom, the 

 improvement of national institutions, the diffusion of 

 general prosperity exhausting on such pure and 

 wholesome themes all the resources of his philo- 

 sophy, all the graces of his style, giving honour to 

 whom honour is due, withholding all incentives to 

 misplaced interest and vicious admiration, and not 

 merely by general remarks on men and on events, but 

 by the manner of describing the one and recording the 

 other, causing us to entertain the proper sentiments, 

 whether of respect or of interest, or of aversion or of 

 indifference, for the various subjects of the narration. 



It is not to be denied, that history written in this 

 spirit must differ materially from any of which we 

 have as yet the experience : it is only to be lamented 

 that those great masters, whose writings we have been 

 contemplating, did not consecrate their mighty talents 



* Milton. 



