Vlll 
PREFACE. 
for mental digestion,, when we look at the strange re- 
volutions often produced by the mere blind passions 
of men. A lesson is read well worth our study, when 
we trace the remote results of causes where there 
has appeared scarcely any relation between the cause 
and the effect. We take a far profounder insight into 
the almost infinitely diversified field of human actions 
and of human motives, and peer with a surer scrutiny 
into the mystical depths which lie profoundly and darkly 
beneath the surface, when we examine history but as the 
great index of humanity, and trace through the long 
lapse of ages the mighty ends which past events both 
dark and bright — those alike which have won our ad- 
miration, and excited our awe — have concurred to 
produce. Battles and massacres are frightful things 
to contemplate, but their ultimate effects upon the 
social condition are often signal and permanent. 
Society, under certain modifications, assumes at times 
its tone and aspect from circumstances, that, in them- 
selves, simply considered, present the most repelling 
features with which the passions or vices of men can 
invest them. As from the ashes which strew the 
forest that has been desolated by fire, a fresher and 
more exuberant growth arises, so from the devastation 
