FALSIFICATION OF ENGLISH HISTORY.
I am myself, and always have been, a member of the Church of England, and
am grieved to hear the many attacks against the Church [frequently most
illiberal attacks], which not so much religion as political rancor gives
birth to in every third journal that I take up. This I say to acquit
myself of all dishonorable feelings, such as I would abhor to co-operate
with, in bringing a very heavy charge against that great body in its
literary capacity. Whosoever has reflected on the history of the English
constitution--must be aware that the most important stage of its
development lies within the reign of Charles I. It is true that the
judicial execution of that prince has been allowed by many persons to
vitiate all that was done by the heroic parliament of November, 1640: and
the ordinary histories of England assume as a matter of course that the
whole period of parliamentary history through those times is to be
regarded as a period of confusion. Our constitution, say they, was formed
in 1688-9. Meantime it is evident to any reflecting man that the
revolution simply re-affirmed the principles developed in the strife
between the two great parties which had arisen in the reign of James I.,
and had ripened and come to issue with each other in the reign of his son.
Our constitution was not a birth of a single instant, as they would
represent it, but a gradual growth and development through a long tract of
time.
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