As history is ordinarily written, it is too often a laudatory declamation, setting forth the objects of its praise in high-sounding periods, and blackening the opposing party by as unqualified a condemnation. As we pass from the perusal of the recorder for one party to the advocate of the other, we are embarrassed by our alternating confidence and distrust. Too often do we leave the question at issue entirely undecided, and perhaps adopt the principle never afterwards to give credit to any historian, whatsoever be his theme. It is true, the skillful student of the past can penetrate successfully through this over-lying inass of embarrassing materials, and can bring up from beneath the whole the simple truth. His practised eye can detect the stroke of the painter's pencil by which this beauty is heightened and that defect is concealed. He can distinguish between the extravagance of the desperate and determined adulator, and the warm-hearted fervor of the honest chronicler. Where testimony is contradictory, and strenuous and artful attempts are made to illuminate that which is dark, and to darken the bright, he may satisfy himself that he has indeed settled down upon the truth.

But the great mass of reading men, even of men well-informed, are not practised students of historic records. They have neither the requisite interest in the points at issue, nor have they the opportunities, the time or the patience, which are required for an independent weighing of oppos ing evidence. However honest may be their intentions, and however sincere their desire to know the simple truth, they are left almost entirely at the disposal of partisan historians and of partisan reviewers.

That historian who would gain a victory for truth by means which a noble mind need not scorn to employ, and a victory also which will be an enduring triumph, should present to his readers the men of past days, as they were when they lived, and suffer them to vindicate their own fame, and achieve their own victories over all those men who are honest enough to love the truth.

To apply these principles to the history of that

greatest strife of modern times, which shook all England, we need not refer to Neal and Calamy on the one side, and compare them with Clarendon and South on the other;-but opening the writings of the men who figured at the head of the contending parties, we fearlessly place Hooker and Cartwright, the one against the other. Let us set Milton and Baxter and Howe over against Hall and Taylor and South. We would not ask to record from the testimony of any of these men a single historic fact, but we would gather from the truths for which each contended, and the spirit which breathes in their writings, our final estimate of the claims of either to our highest regard. From themselves would we learn, which of the two had more of the truth in their understandings and more of its spirit in their hearts, and also which of the two parties deserve most highly the esteem of the present generation.

Let the characteristic merits and excellencies of each be compared, as they are here displayed, and let the claims of each to our highest favor be fairly adjusted. The best men on each side possessed their characteristic and peculiar excellencies, and they were attached to their own views, for what they deemed to be sufficient reasons and sound principles. These excellencies of character, these aims and principles, may and ought to be weighed in the balance against each other. It can be decided, which be of higher worth, the steadfast uprightness with which the one sought for the simple truth, and planted themselves firmly upon whatever they deemed to be an enduring principle, or the steadfast aim of the other, to bring matters of doctrine and discipline only so near the truth as might "stand with godly and christian wisdom;"—which bespeaks the nobler mind, to believe that such wisdom was to be exemplified by yielding to the inflexible decree of the occupant of the throne, or to cherish the strong confidence, that truth, by her innate energy, and with aid from heaven, could, if boldly supported, force her way in face of the arbitrary Henry, the splendid but despotic Elizabeth, and the vain-glorious James. It can be decided who are most to be honored for this