of delineating national annals in no
sectarian spirit but with broad and Christian tolerance,--honestly
seeking to do justice in politics and religion to all,--may so far
separate himself from the strifes of the day as to pronounce opinions as
honest, though perhaps not as learned, as those that issue from the
bench.

There is, too, a great advantage which should not escape our notice in
recording contemporaneous history and fixing permanently the facts of
the time as they occur. He who describes events or periods long since
past, is forced to throw himself back, if possible, into the scenes of
which he writes, whilst he remains free from sympathy with their
factions and parties. But if a writer of the present day will place
himself on the impartial ground of religious and political freedom, and
make himself what Madame de Stael has so felicitously styled
"contemporaneous posterity," I think he will be better able than those
who come after us to narrate with vivid freshness the story of this
sanguinary war.

The impression of public feeling both in Mexico and the United States is
still distinct in our recollection; the political motives influencing or
controlling both the great parties in our country, have not yet ceased
to operate; and the errors that may innocently creep into a narrative
may be corrected by intelligent men who took part in the war as soldiers
or civilians. A history thus dispassionately written, must, it seems to
me, have the truth and value of a portrait taken from life, rather than
of a sketch made from memory whose coloring lacks all the freshness of
vitality.

* * * * *

The very threshold of this history is embarrassed by the party
controversies to which I have alluded. The origin of the war was
attributed by the president and his adherents to the wrong doings of
Mexico, whilst the opponents of the executive did not hesitate to charge
its unnecessary inception and all its errors directly on the cabinet.
Documents, messages, speeches, essays, and reviews, were published to
sustain both sides of the question, and the whole subject was argued
with so much ability and bitterness, so much zeal and apparent
sincerity, that an impartial mind experiences extraordinary difficulty
in detecting the actual offender. That grievances existed in the conduct
of Mexico against us during a long series of years cannot be denied;
but, it is equally true, that, between governments