This, indeed, is evident upon consideration; and is in some sense implied in the very verbal enunciation of the proposition; _vi termini_, it should strike every man who reflects--that in great national transactions of different ages, so far resembling each other as to merit the description of _parallels_, all the circumstances of agreement--all those which compose the resemblance for the very reason that they are _common_ to both periods of time, specially and characteristically belong to neither. It is the differential, and not the common--the points of special dissimilitude, not those of general similitude--which manifestly must be looked to, for the philosophic valuation of the times or the people--for the adjudication of their peculiar claims in a comparison with other times and other people--and for the appraisement of the progress made, whether positively for its total amount, or relatively to itself, for its rate of advance at each separate stage. It is in this way of critical examination, that comparison and the collation of apparent parallels, from being a pure amusement of ingenuity, rises to a philosophic labor, and that the study of History becomes at once dignified and in a most practical sense profitable. It is the opinion of the subtlest and the most combining (if not the most useful) philosopher whom England has produced, that a true knowledge of history confers the gift of prophecy; or that intelligently and sagaciously to have looked backwards, is potentially to have looked forwards. For example, he is of opinion that any student of the great English civil war in the reign of Charles I., who should duly have noted the signs precurrent and concurrent of those days, and should also have read the contemporary political pamphlets, coming thus prepared, could not have failed, after a corresponding study of the French literature from 1750 to 1788, and in particular, after collecting the general sense and temper of the French people from the _Cahiers_, (or codes of instruction transmitted by the electoral bodies to the members of the first National Assembly,) to foresee in clear succession the long career of revolutionary frenzy, which soon afterwards deluged Europe with tears and blood. This may perhaps be conceded, and without prejudice to the doctrine just now delivered, of endless diversity in political events. For it is certain that the political movements of nations obey everlasting laws, and travel through the stages of known cycles, which thus insure enough of resemblance to guarantee the general outline of a sagacious prophecy; whilst on the other hand, the times, the people, and the extraordinary minds which, in such critical eras, soon reveal themselves at the head of affairs, never fail of producing their appropriate and characteristic results of difference. Sameness enough there will always be to encourage the true political seer; with difference enough to confer upon each revolution its separate character