Without expending a word upon that trite theme, the _utility of history_ to all who have any concern in government, I may be allowed to remark, that works for historical instruction, instead of being filled with sieges and battles, should unfold, as much as possible, those occult and less imposing circumstances, which often so materially influence the destinies of nations: the well-timed flattery--the lap-dog saved--the favorite's intrigue--the priest's resentment or ambition--to which field marshals owe their rise, cabinets their dissolution, massacres their carnage, or empires their overthrow. Yet the reader need not be denied the glow he will experience at the story of Thermopylæ, Marathon, Leuctra, or Bunker Hill. All those incidents, too, whether grand or minute, which may serve as warnings or as encouragements to posterity, should be placed in bold relief, and their influence on the current of events, clearly displayed. Numberless opportunities will occur, for impressing upon the minds of young republicans, truths which deeply concern the responsibilities involved in that name: the artifices of demagogues--the danger, in a democracy, of _trusting_ implicitly to the honesty and skill of public agents--the worthlessness of popularity, unless it be "the popularity which _follows_, not that which is _run after_"[11]--the importance of learning to resist the erring impulses of a misguided multitude, not less than the unrighteous mandates of a frowning tyrant[12]--the ease, so often exemplified, with which a people may be duped by the _forms_ of freedom, long after the substance is gone--the incredible aptitude of _example_ to become _precedent_, and of _precedent_ to ripen into _law_, until usurpation is established upon the ruins of liberty--and the difference between _true_ and _false_ GREATNESS, so little appreciated by the mass of mankind. This last point could not be better illustrated, than by a fair comparison of Washington with Bonaparte: a task which Dr. Channing, of Boston, has executed, in an essay among the most elegant and powerful in the English or any other language. [Footnote 11: Lord Mansfield.] [Footnote 12: The "_ardor civium prava jubentium_," not less than the "_vultus instantis tyranni_."] To render _Political Economy_ intelligible to a moderate capacity, dissertations sufficiently plain and full might easily be extracted from the writings of Smith and Say, and from the many luminous discussions, oral and written, which it has undergone in our own country. Miss Martineau has shewn how well its truths may be set forth in the captivating form of tales: and the writings of Mr. Condy Raguet teem with felicitous illustrations.