In a little work, not long since published, intended to interest the rising generation in the history of their own country, the preface assigns as the author's reason for not coming down later than the Revolution of 1689, "that, from that period, history becomes too distinct and important to be trifled with." The doctrine involved in the position, which is implied here, _that the previous history of our country may be trifled with_, is so dangerous to the cause of truth, that we may well believe the sentiment to have fallen from the pen of the author unadvisedly. It is, however, unhappily a principle on which too many, in works of far higher stamp and graver moment, (p. 359) have justified themselves in substituting their own theories, and hypotheses, and descriptive scenes, for the unbending strictness of fact, thus sapping the foundation of all confidence in history. It is not the poet only, and the fascinating author of historical romances, who have thus "trifled with history;" our annalists and chroniclers, our lawyers and moralists, often, no doubt unwittingly, certainly unscrupulously, have countenanced and aided the same pernicious practice. It is frequently curious and amusing to trace the various successive gradations, beginning with surmise, and proceeding through probability onward to positive assertion, each writer borrowing from his predecessor; and then in turn, from his own filling-up of the outline, furnishing somewhat more for another, who supplies at length the whole historical portrait, complete in all its form and colouring. Had the author above referred to not taken to himself practically in the body of his work the indulgence which his latitudinarian principle recognizes in the preface, he would not have so distorted facts in his "story of Madcap Harry and the Old Judge," for the purpose of making a pretty consistent tale,--consistent with itself, but not with the truth of history,--to amuse children in their earliest days, at the risk of misleading them, and giving them a wrong bias through their lives. In examining the alleged fact of Henry's violence and insults exhibited in a court of justice, there is much greater (p. 360) difficulty than may generally be supposed, in consequence of the entire silence of all contemporary annalists and chroniclers. Not one word occurs asserting it; no allusion to the circumstance whatever is found previously to the reign of Henry VIII, nearly a century and a half after Henry V.'s accession. Hume[325] asserts it on the authority of Hall; and Hall has exaggerated the alleged facts most egregiously, and most unjustifiably. Whether the fact took place, and, if it did, what were the time, the place, and the circumstances, the reader must judge for himself. The present treatise professes only to bring together the evidences on all sides fairly.