Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay, vol 1

Life and Letters of Lord
Macaulay, vol 1

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay
by George Otto Trevelyan Copyright laws are changing all over the
world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before
downloading or redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg
eBook.
This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project
Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the
header without written permission.
Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the
eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is
important information about your specific rights and restrictions in how
the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a
donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since
1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of
Volunteers!*****
Title: Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay
Author: George Otto Trevelyan
Release Date: May, 2001 [EBook #2647] [This file was last updated on
March 26, 2002]

Edition: 11
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK
MACAULAY'S LIFE & LETTERS ***

E-Text created by Martin Adamson
[email protected]

Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay
by Sir George Otto Trevelyan

VOLUME I

PREFACE
TO
THE SECOND EDITION.
WHEN publishing the Second Edition of Lord MACAULAY'S Life
and Letters, I may be permitted to say that no pains were spared in
order that the First Edition should be as complete as possible. But, in
the course of the last nine months, I have come into possession of a
certain quantity of supplementary matter, which the appearance of the
book has elicited from various quarters. Stray letters have been hunted
up. Half-forgotten anecdotes have been recalled. Floating
reminiscences have been reduced to shape;--in one case, as will be seen
from the extracts from Sir William Stirling Maxwell's letter, by no
unskilful hand. I should have been tempted to draw more largely upon
these new resources, if it had not been for the examples, which literary
history only too copiously affords, of the risk that attends any attempt
to alter the form, or considerably increase the bulk, of a work which, in
its original shape, has had the good fortune not to displease the public. I
have, however, ventured, by a very sparing selection from sufficiently
abundant material, slightly to enlarge, and, I trust, somewhat to enrich

the book.
If this Second Edition is not rigidly correct in word and substance, I
have no valid excuse to offer. Nothing more pleasantly indicates the
wide-spread interest with which Lord MACAULAY has inspired his
readers, both at home and in foreign countries, than the almost
microscopic care with which these volumes have been studied. It is not
too much to say that, in several instances, a misprint, or a verbal error,
has been brought to my notice by at least five-and-twenty different
persons; and there is hardly a page in the book which has not afforded
occasion for comment or suggestion from some friendly correspondent.
There is no statement of any importance throughout the two volumes
the accuracy of which has been circumstantially impugned; but some
expressions, which have given personal pain or annoyance, have been
softened or removed.
There is another class of criticism to which I have found myself
altogether unable to defer. I have frequently been told by reviewers that
I should "have better consulted MACAULAY'S reputation," or "done
more honour to MACAULAY'S memory," if I had omitted passages in
the letters or diaries which may be said to bear the trace of intellectual
narrowness, or political and religious intolerance. I cannot but think
that strictures, of this nature imply a serious misconception of the
biographer's duty. It was my business to show my Uncle as he was, and
not as I, or any one else, would have had him. If a faithful picture of
MACAULAY could not have been produced without injury to his
memory, I should have left the task of drawing that picture to others;
but, having once undertaken the work, I had no choice but to ask
myself, with regard to each feature of the portrait, not whether it was
attractive, but whether it was characteristic. We who had the best
opportunity of knowing him have always been convinced that his
character would stand the test of an exact, and even a minute,
delineation; and we humbly believe that our confidence was not
misplaced, and that the reading world has now extended to the man the
approbation which it has long conceded to his hooks.
G. O. T.
December 1876.

PREFACE

TO
THE FIRST EDITION,
THIS