These remarks do not concern poetical literature alone, or chiefly.  Those habits of mind, of which I have spoken, ought to make us the best historians.  If Germany has a right to claim the whole realm of the abstract, if Frenchmen understand the framework of society better than we do, there is in the national dramas of Shakespeare an historical secret, which neither the philosophy of the one nor the acute observation of the other can discover.  Yet these dramas are almost the only satisfactory expression of that historical faculty which I believe is latent in us.  The zeal of our factions, a result of our national activity, has made earnest history dishonest:  our English justice has fled to indifferent and sceptical writers for the impartiality which it sought in vain elsewhere.  This resource has failed,—­the indifferentism of Hume could not secure him against his Scotch prejudices, or against gross unfairness when anything disagreeably positive and vehement came in his way.  Moreover, a practical people demand movement and life, not mere judging and balancing.  For a time there was a reaction in favour of party history, but it could not last long; already we are glad to seek in Ranke or Michelet that which seems denied us at home.  Much, no doubt, may be gained from such sources; but I am convinced that this is not the produce which we are meant generally to import; for this we may trust to well-directed native industry.  The time is, I hope, at hand, when those who are most in earnest will feel that therefore they are most bound to be just—­when they will confess the exceeding wickedness of the desire to distort or suppress a fact, or misrepresent a character—­when they will ask as solemnly to be delivered from the temptation to this, as to any crime which is punished by law.

The clergy ought especially to lead the way in this reformation.  They have erred grievously in perverting history to their own purposes.  What was a sin in others was in them a blasphemy, because they professed to acknowledge God as the Ruler of the world, and hereby they showed that they valued their own conclusions above the facts which reveal His order.  They owe, therefore, a great amende to their country, and they should consider seriously how they can make it most effectually.  I look upon this Play as an effort in this direction, which I trust may be followed by many more.  On this ground alone, even if its poetical worth was less than I believe it is, I should, as a clergyman, be thankful for its publication.

F. D. M.

INTRODUCTION