this moment respecting many important parts of our
annals.

The effect of historical reading is analogous, in many respects, to
that produced by foreign travel. The student, like the tourist, is
transported into a new state of society. He sees new fashions. He hears
new modes of expression. His mind is enlarged by contemplating the wide
diversities of laws, of morals, and of manners. But men may travel far,
and return with minds as contracted as if they had never stirred from
their own market-town. In the same manner, men may know the dates of
many battles and the genealogies of many royal houses, and yet be
no wiser. Most people look at past times as princes look at foreign
countries. More than one illustrious stranger has landed on our island
amidst the shouts of a mob, has dined with the king, has hunted with the
master of the stag-hounds, has seen the guards reviewed, and a knight
of the garter installed, has cantered along Regent Street, has visited
Saint Paul's, and noted down its dimensions; and has then departed,
thinking that he has seen England. He has, in fact, seen a few public
buildings, public men, and public ceremonies. But of the vast and
complex system of society, of the fine shades of national character, of
the practical operation of government and laws, he knows nothing. He who
would understand these things rightly must not confine his observations
to palaces and solemn days. He must see ordinary men as they appear in
their ordinary business and in their ordinary pleasures. He must mingle
in the crowds of the exchange and the coffee-house. He must obtain
admittance to the convivial table and the domestic hearth. He must bear
with vulgar expressions. He must not shrink from exploring even the
retreats of misery. He who wishes to understand the condition of mankind
in former ages must proceed on the same principle. If he attends only to
public transactions, to wars, congresses, and debates, his studies will
be as unprofitable as the travels of those imperial, royal, and serene
sovereigns who form their judgment of our island from having gone in
state to a few fine sights, and from having held formal conferences with
a few great officers.

The perfect historian is he in whose work the character and spirit of
an age is exhibited in miniature. He relates no fact, he attributes no
expression to his characters, which is not authenticated by sufficient
testimony. But, by judicious selection, rejection, and a