may be found
in the extreme difficulty of assigning a proper measure to such a
catalogue. A naked list of names and editions would not be satisfactory
either to myself or my readers: the characters of the principal Authors
of the Roman and Byzantine History have been occasionally connected
with the events which they describe; a more copious and critical inquiry
might indeed deserve, but it would demand, an elaborate volume, which
might swell by degrees into a general library of historical writers.
For the present, I shall content myself with renewing my serious
protestation, that I have always endeavored to draw from the
fountain-head; that my curiosity, as well as a sense of duty, has always
urged me to study the originals; and that, if they have sometimes eluded
my search, I have carefully marked the secondary evidence, on whose
faith a passage or a fact were reduced to depend.

I shall soon revisit the banks of the Lake of Lausanne, a country which
I have known and loved from my early youth. Under a mild government,
amidst a beauteous landscape, in a life of leisure and independence,
and among a people of easy and elegant manners, I have enjoyed, and may
again hope to enjoy, the varied pleasures of retirement and society.
But I shall ever glory in the name and character of an Englishman: I am
proud of my birth in a free and enlightened country; and the approbation
of that country is the best and most honorable reward of my labors. Were
I ambitious of any other Patron than the Public, I would inscribe
this work to a Statesman, who, in a long, a stormy, and at length an
unfortunate administration, had many political opponents, almost
without a personal enemy; who has retained, in his fall from power,
many faithful and disinterested friends; and who, under the pressure of
severe infirmity, enjoys the lively vigor of his mind, and the felicity
of his incomparable temper. Lord North will permit me to express the
feelings of friendship in the language of truth: but even truth and
friendship should be silent, if he still dispensed the favors of the
crown.

In a remote solitude, vanity may still whisper in my ear, that my
readers, perhaps, may inquire whether, in the conclusion of the present
work, I am now taking an everlasting farewell. They shall hear all that
I know myself, and all that I could reveal to the most intimate friend.
The motives of action or silence are now equally balanced; nor can I
pronounce, in my mos