THE MODEL MERCHANT 



history from being handed over unconditionally to the region of fable, 

 to withdraw it from its mere elementary character as a child's book, 

 and to place it in its proper light, as occupying (as I believe it has 

 every right to do) a distinguished place in our standard biographies, 

 that I have put together the result of my researches. Not that I 

 would rob my young friends of one atom of their amusement, or de- 

 prive them of one jot of their delight, in which I most fully sympathize ; 

 but I would give them some real foundation upon which to found the 

 example which the story should inculcate. 



Many persons who have never heard a question as to its being any 

 thing else than a child's story, may think it a fzivolous theme upon 

 which to write a work of this kind. I would request them to 

 suspend their judgments until I have placed before them the facts 

 which I have gathered from notices of our hero, scattered here and 

 tliere, in books admitted as genuine histoiy, corroborated by other 

 circumstances which I have to show you, but which I do not think 

 any one has ever yet thought it worth while to string together, so as 

 to form a continuous biography, however brief, of AVhittington and 

 his Cat. I say his Cat also, because they are inseparable. I have a 

 great regard for Biographical Notices of distinguished persons, as one 

 of the most pleasing and attractive modes of instruction in our moral, 

 social, and religious duties ; but if the truth of the narrative be once 

 called into question, its value as a pattern and example is immediately 

 weakened, and we can no longer depend upon it for enforcing those 

 virtues to which it points. Indeed, in consequence of the supposed 

 romance of the storj', persons had begun to impugn the veiy existence 

 of "Whittington himself. 



Next to our cstablisliing the truth of our biographies, there is 

 another circumstance which gives them an additional interest and 

 claim upon our attention. I mean Avhcre we can connect the subject 

 of the histoiy with ourselves, our own country, our own county, our 

 own town, or our own village. It is very important to excite a local 

 interest, especially in young people, and to show what their prede- 

 cessors have accomplished ; because what has been done by others may 

 be done by themselves; and when men have risen to eminence with 

 feiv facilities, surely with all our present appliances of education we 

 ought to be able to accomplish a great deal more. 



