It has been seen, first, by external evidence, that these papers are spurious, because the notorious ambition of Morton and Murray, and the perilous predicament in which it finally placed them, rendered their fabrication necessary to save themselves from ruin,--because Mary could not have written any love-letters or sonnets to Bothwell, for whom, at best, she never felt any thing but common regard, and who was obliged to seize and carry off her person, in order to force her into an unwilling marriage,--because such letters, if they had been written, would not have been preserved by Bothwell, or, if preserved, would have been more numerous,--because the story of their discovery is altogether improbable, since Bothwell, for the most satisfactory reasons, would never have thought of sending for them to the Castle of Edinburgh on the 20th of June 1567,--because not a word was said about them long after they were discovered, but, on the contrary, motives quite inconsistent with their contents assigned for sequestrating Mary's person in Loch-Leven,--because, though Dalgleish was tried, condemned, and executed, not a question was put to him, as appears by his examination, still extant, concerning these letters,--because the originals were only produced twice, and _that_ under suspicious and unsatisfactory circumstances,--because nothing but translations, and translations from translations, of these originals, now exist, from which no fair arguments can be drawn,--because Murray and his associates have been convicted of open forgery in several other instances, and are therefore the more liable to be doubted in this,--because Bothwell not only never accused Mary, but was unable to show Morton any writing of her's sanctioning the murder, and, by subsequent declarations, seems to have exculpated her from all share in it,--because Mary herself invariably denied that she had ever written such letters, undertaking to prove that they were fabrications, if the originals, or even copies, were shown to her,--because Lady Lennox, Darnley's mother, many of the most respectable of the Scottish nobility, Norfolk, and a numerous party in England, and all her Continental friends, avowed their belief of her innocence,--because the confessions and depositions of Bothwell's accomplices, so far from implicating, tended to acquit her of all blame, though the persons by whom the depositions were made had every inducement to accuse her, if it had been in their power,--and because the external evidence, advanced in support of the letters by Robertson and others, is entirely nugatory.