Chap. XVII.] Histvrij. 3:?9 



culiar kind wliicli attracts our notice. No former 

 period, certainly, can be compared to this with 

 respect to the multiplication of iiistorical records. 

 Scarcely any portion of time, or the affairs of any 

 nation, or the lives of any conspicuous monarchs, 

 have escaped the notice of some writer who aspired 

 to the rank of an historian. Indeed tljis, like every 

 other department of modern composition, has be- 

 come, witlrin a lew years past, so crowded with ad- 

 venturers as to render the enuuieration of them 

 next to an impossible task. 



The Instorians of the first class in the eighteenth 

 century presented tlieir readers with a greater por- 

 tion of truth, and instructive matter, than any 

 preceding writers of the same class. The works of 

 the best Greek historians are notoriously corrupted 

 by a large mixture of fable. The same rein ark 

 may be applied, though not to an equal extent, to 

 the finest Roman models. The best historical works 

 of modern Europe are certainly entitled to n^.ore 

 credit, with respect to authenticity. It is not meant 

 to be asserted that they are free from misrepresent- 

 ation and fable, with which they all, in different 

 degrees, abound; but merely that they contain 

 much less of thesfi than their predecessors. The 

 reasons of this superioiity are obvious. The an* 

 cient historians could only consult manuscripts and 

 traditional records. The forrner were cou;para- 

 tively rare, difficult of access, liable to mutilation 

 and other injuries, and not easily corrected, wluju 

 erroneous, by collations with many others which 

 detailed the same facts. The latter is a source of 

 information so obviously imperfect and fabuloui 



that no prudent writer, in ordinary cases, would 



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