ve already settled on
circumstances which took place scarcely beyond the recollection of
living people, can we wonder at that which invests the events of a
more remote epoch? If editors in our enlightened time have contrived
so soon to give the history of Burns a mythical character, what safety
have we in trusting to such ancient narrations as those of Plutarch or
Thucydides? On the other hand, where even such a biography as that of
Burns is placed by sound and carefully-examined evidence upon an
irrefragable basis, a service is rendered to the public beyond the
merits of any immediate question that may be under discussion, in the
encouragement which it gives to historical inquirers of all grades, to
rest satisfied with nothing on vague assertion, but to sift everything
to the bottom.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Life and Works of Robert Burns, edited by Robert Chambers. 4 vols.
Edinburgh: W. & R. Chambers.

ONE-SIDEDNESS.

_Plantagenet._ The truth appears _so_ naked on my side,
That any purblind eye may find it out.
_Somerset._ And on my side it is so well apparelled,
So clear, so shining, and so evident,
That it will glimmer through a blind man's eye.

_First Part of Henry VI._

Having made up our mind upon a question, probably by a delightfully
curt process, how pleasant and natural it is to laugh sublimely at all
dissentients! Poor creatures, those nonconformists are almost to be
pardoned, so much does their impenetrable dulness amuse us! How they
_can_ have scrambled to a conclusion opposite to ours, is a problem so
absurd that it tickles us amazingly.

Yet the formation of opinions is vastly dependent upon circumstances.
Whang-shing is born in the Celestial Empire; and the chances are that
the fellow will go the length of pinning his faith to Confucius.
Yonder squalid urchin, turning out of Saffron Hill or some other
sweet-scented purlieus, has been cradled on the ragged lap of
professional mendicancy; and there is a strong probability that he
will come to a misunderstanding with the police one of these fine
days. The mild-eyed priest who just passed you, was born and educated
within the states of the church; and somehow or other he firmly
believes in the Romanism you so hotly repudiate. The sallow-faced
gentleman crossing the road, and exhibiting so wobegone an aspect, has
always had a bad liver; and you will