is "History of the Reformation," which he largely drew from the
Cottonian collection. Our early historians only repeated a tale ten
times told. Milton, who wanted not for literary diligence, had no fresh
stores to open for his "History of England;" while Hume despatches,
comparatively in a few pages, a subject which has afforded to the
fervent diligence of my learned friend Sharon Turner volumes precious to
the antiquary, the lawyer, and the philosopher.

To illustrate my idea of the usefulness and of the absolute necessity of
SECRET HISTORY, I fix first on _a public event_, and secondly on _a
public character_; both remarkable in our own modern history, and both
serving to expose the fallacious appearances of popular history by
authorities indisputably genuine. The _event_ is the Restoration of
Charles the Second; and the _character_ is that of Mary, the queen of
William the Third.

In history the Restoration of Charles appears in all its splendour--the
king is joyfully received at Dover, and the shore is covered by his
subjects on their knees--crowds of the great hurry to Canterbury--the
army is drawn up, in number and with a splendour that had never been
equalled--his enthusiastic reception is on his birthday, for that was
the lucky day fixed on for his entrance into the metropolis--in a word,
all that is told in history describes a monarch the most powerful and
the most happy. One of the tracts of the day, entitled "England's
Triumph," in the mean quaintness of the style of the times, tells us
that "The soldiery, who had hitherto made _clubs_ trump, resolve now to
enthrone the _king of hearts_." Turn to the faithful memorialist, who so
well knew the secrets of the king's heart, and who was himself an actor
behind the curtain; turn to Clarendon, in his own Life, and we shall
find that the power of the king was then as dubious as when he was an
exile; and his feelings were so much racked, that he had nearly resolved
on a last flight.

Clarendon, in noticing the temper and spirit of that time, observes,
"Whoever reflects upon all this composition of contradictory wishes and
expectations, must confess that the king was not yet the master of the
kingdom, nor his _authority_ and _security_ such as _the general noise
and acclamation, the bells and the bonfires, proclaimed it to
be_."--"The first mortification the king met with as soon as he arrived
at Canterbury, within three hours after he landed at Dover." Clarendon
t