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keep their true use and value in view, theories of conjecture are just as 
valuable with regard to civil or political truth, as they are with respect to 
science. (Cheers.) 
Mr. Forsyth. — I will detain you with very few remarks in reply. With 
reference to what was said by Dr. Currey, who complains that I have 
devoted too much attention to historical anecdotes, if he looks at the 
paper again, he will find that there is but one page of anecdotes, and 
there are twenty- one pages devoted to the rest of the subject. I have 
to thank my right hon. friend, Mr. Cave, for his defence of the use of 
anecdotes in history. You will find that many so-called historical facts 
to which we attach importance, are simply anecdotes. Let me mention 
one case, — that of the Treaty of Utrecht ; it is said that that treaty was 
made by the Tories because Mrs. Masham spilt a cup of tea on Queen Anne’s 
gown, whereupon Queen Anne, in a pet, quarrelled with the Whigs, and 
went to the Tories, which led to the Treaty of Utrecht, and changed the face 
of Europe. It is objected that I did not in my paper lay down, in a tabulated 
form, the canons of historical criticism. I did not do so, because nothing is 
so dull and repulsive as such a tabulation. It is all very well for the blue- 
book of a statistician ; but in the paper I thought it out of place. 
I am happy to say that every single rule which has been suggested 
by Dr. Currey and Mr. Sinclair, will be found implied, and even stated 
and illustrated, in the paper. Not one single rule has been suggested 
which is not to be found in the paper. Only one other remark ; Dr. Currey 
has said that my paper has supplied him with nothing to go upon. I am 
very sorry for it ; but I do not think it is so useful to tell people what 
they are to believe, and to make them as credulous as possible 
with regard to the history of the past, as to caution them with reference 
to the kind of evidence they ought to rely upon, and with regard to what 
they ought to believe. We have lately had a most humiliating spectacle 
in England of the credulity of mankind. I would not have alluded 
to it for one moment if the trial * had still been going on, but to me 
nothing has been more humiliating as regards the British public, than to 
find that for a period of two years and a half it has been possible to keep 
up a gross and gigantic imposture, when the whole question was a question 
of evidence and perfectly germane to the subject. Minds which are accustomed 
to deal with and to weigh evidence — conflicting evidence — in evenly-balanced 
scales, could have had no doubt as to the result. In every case that can 
be mentioned, or in almost every case, there are arguments for, and argu- 
ments against. As Dr. Johnson said, there are arguments for a plenum 
in nature, and arguments for a vacuum in nature, but there must be either 
the one or the other. Let us illustrate this by the case in question. A man is 
said to have perished eighteen years ago. After twelve years have elapsed, 
a man comes forth and says : — “ I am that man, and have risen, as it were. 
* The Tichborne Trial. 
