PREFACE ΤΟ THE FIRST EDITION. WHEN HEN I undertook the Work which is now fubmitted to the Public, I did not overlook the difficulties of the execution, nor over-rate my own powers. I FULLY appreciated the delicacy of detailing the annals of a living Sovereign, and of defcanting on the conduct and motives of men who yet furvive, or who have been recently removed from the bufy fcene. I was aware that bitter calumny or fulfome adulation had disfigured most of their characters; and that the real image of perfons, as well as the true colour of events, could with difficulty be difcerned through the noxious mist or fplendid vapour. I knew that other writers had executed the fame tafk, and had even extended their labours to a nearer, and confequently more interesting period than that which it was my intention for the present to occupy; and as my manner of eftimating characters, and confidering events differed materially from theirs, I did not disguise from myself the reasons for apprehending, that my Work would be exposed to some disadvantages from the effects of prepoffeffion. HISTORY has been termed, by a juft and well known definition, Philofophy, inftructing by examples; but the nature of the doctrine will always be confiderably influenced by the temper, views, and prejudices of the hiftorian: and that writer must be highly culpable, who, before he undertakes the task of directing the opinions of mankind on the most important fubjects, omits examining with diligence and candour the feelings, limits, and bias of his own mind, eftimating his means of information, and earneftly feeking to discover, with a view of mitigating, their effects, the predilections, antipathies, hopes, and fears by which he is actuated. If these are suffered to operate in difcolouring the narrative, which ought to be given with the utmost candour, the Author is guilty of a fraud in announcing his Work as a Hiftory; it is, at the utmost but an Historical Effay, in which the Writer affuming the part of a difputant, bends facts, characters, and circumstances to his own views; falfifies, fuppreffes, or perverts them, to fuit his purposes; and instead of informing, feeks only to perfuade, feduce, or corrupt the reader. WORKS written in this manner, and published under the denomination of History, are filled with redundant and indifcriminate praise of fome individuals; while others are loaded with malevolent and unfparing abuse. To justify these extremes, Authors imagine, for the perfonages of their narratives, a confiftent uniformity of intention and conduct, which truth never has been able to pourtray; nor a careful infpector of human life to difcern. That men should be stedfastly patriotic, and, in their pursuit of the public good, always temperate, juft, and felf-denying, is very defirable; but the historian feels, with regret, the neceffity of recording the aberrations of the most elevated minds; and that work must be a romance, not a history, which fails to fhew that individuals, whofe general views have been directed to the benefit of their country, have been, in occafional acts, rafh, vain, factious, arbitrary, or abfurd. Such are the materials prefented by the course of events, that a party writer, taking the bright or the clouded parts of characters, receiving with avidity the vehement affertions of panegyrifts or 3 detrac detractors, and fuppreffing the facts or obfervations on the other fide, may, for the moment, make almost any impreffion, without foregoing the appearance of candour; but truth will, in time, forcibly appeal against fuch mifreprefentations; and the glofs of exaggerated applaufe, and the blots of unmerited cenfure being removed, her interesting features will be contemplated with a regard heightened in confequence of the temporary concealment. It may be doubted, whether the period is yet arrived, when the confpicuous perfons of the present reign can be fo impartially reviewed. The heat of party contest has rendered the public fo familiar with calumniatory declamation, that the historian incurs fome risk in venturing to difmifs from his vocabulary certain abufive phrases, or in prefuming to doubt of certain fuppofed political facts fo gravely advanced, and fo forcibly urged by the wife and the eloquent. He exposes himself to a still greater hazard in attempting to rescue from long accredited imputations, characters, whom the enmity of faction, and the greedy credulity of the public, have confecrated to obloquy; and in venturing to fhew, that in many inftances unblushing calumny has been mistaken for fober truth, faction for patriotism, and selfishness for public spirit. I SUCH has often been the nature of my tafk; in the execution of which, it has been my endeavour to avoid a too common error; I have not, in order to illuftrate the principles and conduct of one man whom I thought injured, retaliated on his opponents. have been flow in imputing to individuals those base defigns against either Liberty or Government, which have been so profufely affigned to them. I have rally found in the state of party connexions, and the legitimate objects of honourable ambition, fufficient means of accounting for the actions of men either poffeffed of or struggling for power, without feigning as a cause of their conduct, an excess of mental de pravity A 3 gene |