is often too strong to be stated. There is always a reactionary
party, or one at least which lingers sentimentally over the dream of
past golden ages, such as that of which Cowley says, with a sort of
naive blasphemy, at which one knows not whether to smile or sigh -


'When God, the cause to me and men unknown,
Forsook the royal houses, and his own.'


These have full liberty to say all they can in praise of the defeated
system; but the historian has no such liberty to state the case
against it. If he even asserts that he has counter-facts, but dare
not state them, he is at once met with a praejudicium. The mere fact
of his having ascertained the truth is imputed as a blame to him, in
a sort of prudish cant. 'What a very improper person he must be to
like to dabble in such improper books that they must not even be
quoted.' If in self-defence he desperately gives his facts, he only
increases the feeling against him, whilst the reactionists, hiding
their blushing faces, find in their modesty an excuse for avoiding
the truth; if, on the other hand, he content himself with bare
assertion, and with indicating the sources from whence his
conclusions are drawn, what care the reactionists? They know well
that the public will not take the trouble to consult manuscripts,
State papers, pamphlets, rare biographies, but will content
themselves with ready-made history; and they therefore go on
unblushing to republish their old romance, leaving poor truth, after
she has been painfully haled up to the well's mouth, to tumble
miserably to the bottom of it again.