Yet on this subject, as well as upon some others, there often exists, at the same time, too much faith, and too little; for, from a want of acquaintance with the details on which-a rational conviction of the genuineness and validity of ancient records may be founded, many persons, even though otherwise well informed, feel that they have hardly an alternative between a simple acceptance of the entire mass of ancient history, or an equally indiscriminate suspicion of the whole. And when it happens that a particular fact comes to be questioned, or when the genuineness of some ancient book is argued, such persons, conscious that they are little familiar with the nature of the evidence on the strength of which the question turns, and perceiving that the controversy involves many recondite and uninteresting researches, or that it rests upon the validity of minute criticisms, either recoil altogether from the argument, or they accept an opinion, without inquiry, from that party on whose judgment they think they may most safely rely. And it is true that such controversies may, for the most part, very properly be left in the hands of critics and antiquarians, whose tastes and acquirements qualify them for investigations that can scarcely be made intelligible to the mass of readers. Nor are the facts involved in these controversies often of any importance to the general student of history; for they do not extensively affect the integrity of that department of literature to which they belong. Yet it must be allowed that the _principles_ on which such questions are argued, and the facts connected with the transmission of ancient literature to modern times, are in themselves highly important; and that they well deserve more attention than they often receive. Nor are these facts, when separated from particular controversies, at all abstruse, or difficult of apprehension. Indeed much of the information that bears upon the subject is in itself curious and highly interesting, as well as important. Even in relation to those works of genius, the value of which consists in their intrinsic merits, and which would not be robbed of their beauties, though they were discovered to be spurious, an assurance of their genuineness is felt by every reader to conduce greatly to the pleasure they impart. But a much stronger feeling naturally leads us to demand this assurance in the perusal of works which profess to have reality only for their matter:--Truth is the very subject of History:--the adducing of satisfactory evidence, therefore, of the integrity of its records may well be deemed an indispensable preliminary to a course of study in that department of knowledge.