XIX. I have always admired Titus Livius, not only for his eminent discretion, method, and judgment, but also for his veracity. He does not conceal or dissemble the failings of the Romans, when in the course of his history they come in the way of his pen; but on the contrary he lays them open and exposes them; and what is more, at the hazard of offending Augustus, he highly extolled Pompey, and blazoned his character as preferrable to Cæsar’s, which in those times amounted to the same thing, as declaring himself a zealous republican. Notwithstanding this, I observe a fault in this prince of historians, which if it did not proceed from want of his adverting to, or being aware of it, we must confess to be the effect of his passion for the marvellous. In the two first ages of their republic, he gives an account of as many battles gained, and as many cities taken by the Romans, as would be sufficient to compleat the conquest of a vast empire; but at the end of this time, we see that republic confined within such narrow bounds, that few less states are at this day to be found in all Italy, which is a proof that the antecedent victories, were not so many nor so great in the original, as they are represented to be in the copy. XX. There is scarce one of the modern historians I have read, in whom I have not observed the same inconsistency. If they relate the events of a long war, they paint them so favourably to their own side, that the reader from those premises, is induced to promise himself, that it will end in an advantageous peace, in which his nation will give the law to the enemy; but as the premises are false, the conclusion does not follow, and in the end, he finds things turn out quite contrary to what he expected. XXI. I am not insensible, that during a war, such sort of lies may be politically necessary; therefore in all countries, they print Gazettes with privilege; I don’t say of lying, but of colouring events, so that they should not dishearten, but seem encouraging to the people; and in their description of things, they imitate the artifice of Apelles, who painted Antigonus in profile, to conceal his being blind of one eye; I mean, that they display the favourable side of events, and cover the adverse one by a deception. I say, that policy requires this should be done in Gazettes, to prevent the subjects being dismayed by the adverse strokes of fortune; but in books that are written many years after the transactions, what danger is there in speaking the truth?