P R E F A C E . T h e importance o f the letters o f em inent men, as illu s­ trations of their life, character, and tim es, is too w ell understood to need remark. The Letters of Cicero and PUny have given us a more vivid conception of Roman life than the m ost careful history could have g iv e n ; the Letters of Erasmus, Luther, and Calvin furnish us w ith the m ost trust­ worthy m aterial for understanding the rapid movement and fierce conflict of their a g e ; when w e read the volum inous correspondence of Pope and h is compeers, or the unstudied beauties of Cowper’s letters of friendship, w e seem t o . be in the company of liv in g m e n ; and modem history has in nothing more d istin ctly proved its sagacity, than by its d ili­ gence in publishing the Letters of Cromwell, of W ashington, o f Chatham, and of other historical personages. For biography, fam iliar letters are the m ost important material. In a man’s published w ritings w e see the general character of his mind, and w e ascertain his opinions in so far as he deemed it safe or advisable to lay these before a per­ haps unsym pathizing p u b lic ; in h is letters he reveals his whole character, his feelings as WbU as his judgments, his m otives, his personal history, and the various ramifications of his interest. In his fam iliar correspondence we see the man as he is known to h is intim ate friends, in his tim es of relaxa­ tion and unstudied utterance.^ Eew men, in w riting for the ‘ “ U t oculi aliis corporis sensibus prsestant, ita iUustrium virorum Epistol® caeteris eorum scriptis passim antecellunt. ”— Benedictine Preface to the Ep. A u g . '