he precise merit and demerit of every historical personage,
with whose names they become acquainted; but this impatience should
not be gratified by the short method of referring to the characters
given of these persons in any common historical abridgment. We should
advise all such characters to be omitted in books for children; let
those who read, form a judgment for themselves: this will do more
service to the understanding, than can be done by learning by rote the
opinion of any historian. The good and bad qualities; the decisive,
yet contradictory, epithets, are so jumbled together in these
characters, that no distinct notion can be left in the reader's mind;
and the same words recur so frequently in the characters of different
kings, that they are read over in a monotonous voice, as mere
concluding sentences, which come of course, at the end of every reign.
"King Henry the Fifth, was tall and slender, with a long neck,
engaging aspect, and limbs of the most elegant turn. **********. His
valour was such as no danger could startle, and no difficulty could
oppose. He managed the dissentions amongst his enemies with such
address as spoke him consummate in the arts of the cabinet. He was
chaste, temperate, modest, and devout, scrupulously just in his
administration, and severely exact in the discipline of his army, upon
which he knew his glory and success in a great measure depended. In a
word, it must be owned that he was without an equal in the arts of
war, policy, and government. His great qualities were, however,
somewhat obscured by his ambition, and his natural propensity to
cruelty."

Is it possible that a child of seven or eight years old can acquire
any distinct, or any just ideas, from the perusal of this character of
Henry the fifth? Yet it is selected as one of the best drawn
characters from a little abridgment of the history of England, which
is, in general, as well done as any we have seen. Even the least
exceptionable historic abridgments require the corrections of a
patient parent. In abridgments for children, the facts are usually
interspersed with what the authors intend for moral reflections, and
easy explanations of political events, which are meant to be suited
to _the meanest capacities_. These reflections and explanations do
much harm; they instil prejudice, and they accustom the young
unsuspicious reader to swallow absurd reasoning, merely because it is
often presented to him. If no history can b