Reflections of the Author on commencing his Memoirs of the Year 1752--State of Parties--Treaty with Saxony--Duke of Bedford opposes it--Debates upon it in the Lords--Speeches of the Duke of Newcastle, Lord Sandwich, Marquis of Halifax, and Lord Granville--History of the Purchase of Scotch Forfeited Estates--Debates on the Scotch Forfeiture Bill. I sit down to resume a task, for which I fear posterity will condemn the author, at the same time that they feel their curiosity gratified. On reviewing the first part of these Memoirs, I find the truth rigidly told. And even since they were written, I have often been struck with the censures which are passed on such historians as have fairly displayed the faulty sides of the characters they exhibit. Theopompus is called a satirist: Timæus was so severe,[204] as to be nicknamed Epitimæus, the Blamer. Some of our own annalists, as Wilson, Weldon, Osborn, (though frequently quoted,) are seldom mentioned without reproach. I defend them not: if their representations are exaggerated, they not only deserve reproach, but discredit. On the other hand, I examined the candid authors. Two of our own, who deal wonderfully in panegyric, Clarendon and Echard, I find to have dispensed invectives with a liberal hand on men of parties opposite to their own--does then the province of praise and censure depend on the felicity of choosing one’s party? _That_ shall never influence me--I would as soon wish to be rejected for flattering one party, as for blaming another. Nor can I, on the strictest consideration, determine to write like biographers and authors of Peerages and Compendiums, who sink all executions in a family, all blots in a ’scutcheon, and lay out their personages as fair as if they wrote epitaphs, not history. Does any noble family extinguish? One should grieve, on reading their genealogies, that such a succession of heroes, statesmen, patriots, should ever fail; if a little knowledge of mankind did not call forth the blemishes, which these varnishers have slubbered over. If I write, I must write facts. The times I describe have neither been glorious nor fortunate. Have our affairs gone ill, and yet were our Governors wise? Have Parliaments been venal, servile, and yet individuals upright? If I paint the battle of Dettingen in prosperous colours, am I an admired historian? If I mention hostages sent to France, am I an abusive one? Are there no shades, no degrees of vices and misconduct? Must no Princes be blamed, till they are Neros? Must Vespasian’s avarice pass unnoticed, because he did not set fire to the city--because he did not burn the means of gratifying his exactions?