f of either,) it is equally, at
least, intelligible on the supposition of his full and undoubting
conviction of his right to all he claimed. And just as open would any
individual plaintiff be to the charge of hypocrisy, who, after having
insisted upon his full rights, and given notice of trial, and
collected his witnesses, should, on the very eve of the issue being
tried, write to the defendant, urging him to yield, and avoid the
expense and irritation of a protracted law-suit, offering at the same
time a remission of some portion of his claim,--as Henry is in
fairness chargeable with hypocrisy because he wrote to his "adversary
of France," urging him to yield, and avoid the effusion of blood. On
the very eve of his departure for the shores of Normandy, many facts
and circumstances assure us that Henry acted under a full persuasion
that he demanded of France only what was in strict justice his due
when he laid claim to those territories and honours which had been so
long withheld from the Kings of England, his predecessors. Facts are
decidedly against the charge of hypocrisy; but, even were the facts
doubtful, his general character for honesty, and openness, and manly
straightforward dealing, (to which history bears abundant evidence,)
would make the scale of justice preponderate in his favour.

In dismissing this subject, parallel with these modern accusations (p. 116)
of Henry on the ground of "cajoling hypocrisy" we may lay the
testimony borne by his contemporary, Walsingham,[92] to the
unsuspecting simplicity of his mind, which exposed him to the (p. 117)
overreaching designs of the unprincipled and crafty. In his Ypodigma
Neustriae, a work expressly written for the use and profit of Henry,
and with a view of putting him upon his guard against the intrigues
of foreign courts, he refers to his "innocence liable to be (p. 118)
circumvented, and his noble character likely to be deceived, by the
cunning craftiness and hypocritical fraud and false promises of his
enemies."

[Footnote 92: The Dedication of the Ypodigma
Neustriae claims for itself a place in this work;
and to no part can it be more appropriately
appended than to this, in which modern charges
strongly contrasted with his view are examined. The
following is a literal translation of the
introduction to this work of