Produced by Steven Giacomelli, Graeme Mackreth and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) THE HISTORY OF FREEDOM AND OTHER ESSAYS MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO ATLANTA . SAN FRANSISCO THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA LTD. TORONTO [Illustration: Acton] THE HISTORY OF FREEDOM AND OTHER ESSAYS BY JOHN EMERICH EDWARD DALBERG-ACTON FIRST BARON ACTON D.C.L., L.L.D., ETC. ETC. REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY JOHN NEVILLE FIGGIS, Litt.D. SOMETIME LECTURER IN ST. CATHARINE'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE AND REGINALD VERE LAURENCE, M.A. FELLOW AND LECTURER OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON 1909 _First Edition 1907_ _Reprinted 1909_ PREFATORY NOTE The Editors desire to thank the members of the Acton family for their help and advice during the preparation of this volume and of the volume of _Historical Essays and Studies_. They have had the advantage of access to many of Acton's letters, especially those to Doellinger and Lady Blennerhasset. They have thus been provided with valuable material for the Introduction. At the same time they wish to take the entire responsibility for the opinions expressed therein. They are again indebted to Professor Henry Jackson for valuable suggestions. This volume consists of articles reprinted from the following journals: _The Quarterly Review_, _The English Historical Review_, _The Nineteenth Century_, _The Rambler_, _The Home and Foreign Review_, _The North British Review_, _The Bridgnorth Journal_. The Editors have to thank Mr. John Murray, Messrs. Longmans, Kegan Paul, Williams and Norgate, and the proprietors of _The Bridgnorth Journal_ for their kind permission to republish these articles, and also the Delegacy of the Clarendon Press for allowing the reprint of the Introduction to Mr. Burd's edition of _Il Principe_. They desire to point out that in _Lord Acton and his Circle_ the article on "The Protestant Theory of Persecution" is attributed to Simpson: this is an error. J.N.F. R.V.L. _August 24, 1907._ CONTENTS PAGE PORTRAIT OF LORD ACTON _Frontispiece_ CHRONICLE viii INTRODUCTION ix I. THE HISTORY OF FREEDOM IN ANTIQUITY 1 II. THE HISTORY OF FREEDOM IN CHRISTIANITY 30 III. SIR ERSKINE MAY'S DEMOCRACY IN EUROPE 61 IV. THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW 101