PREFACE. 



A PREFACE to a work is perhaps now seldom perused, often to the readers 

 loss, nevertheless, to such of my readers who have the good grace to make 

 the exception I may say to gather the matter for this work I have drawn 

 from various authors, which for a short time I thought to quote in exact 

 chronological order, but I soon perceived to do so entirely, I should debar 

 myself of evidence tending to buttress the various statements and facts 

 advanced, und I fail to see why any author should shackle himself 

 with any arbitrary system, and if by following the plan of quoting more 

 recent writers to bear out and throw light on ancient statements ; I 

 have somewhat marred the system of my arrangement, I feel I have 

 strengthened the work, which is the feature I care more about, than for 

 any scholar like or customary system of book writing. 



In defence of the plan I have followed, as La Motte says, " the preju- 

 dice for antiquity is itself very ancient. " I may fairly assume, that most 

 authors have gathered their ideas on historical subjects which have pre- 

 ceded them ; from the more ancient writings of their forebears. Thus 

 the immortal Shakespeare with all his keen perception and intuitive know- 

 ledge of the world, owed much of his historical information to authors 

 he had read. For as Chaucer has it. 



' For out of the olde fieldes, men saithe, 

 Cometh all this new corn fro yere to yere, 

 And out of olde bookes, ii> good faithe, 

 Cometh all this newe science that men here. " 



The Assembly of Foul cs 



And Cicero says, " The distinguishing property of man is to search for 

 and follow after truth, therefore when relaxed from our necessary cares 

 and concerns, we then covet to see, 'to hear, and to learn somewhat Cicero 

 Lib. 1. Ch. v. Virgil still more beautifully expresses this sentiment of 

 the love of knowledge in the Georgics Lib ii. line 490 " Happy is he who is 

 able to trace out the origin of things " and further Lord Bacon wrote on 

 the advancement of Learning Lib ii. " Oat of monuments, names, wordes, 

 proverbs, traditions, private records and evidences, fragments of stories, 

 passages of books and the like, we doe save and recover somewhat from 

 the deluge of time. " 



