Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/103

 But if Hume and those who, like Isaac Disraeli and Mr. Gifford, have taken a view similar to his, that the unfavourable opinion of James I. is a re-echo of the yell of the Nonconformists of James's time, had ever read Clarendon carefully, they might have seen cause for grave reflection on the significance of Clarendon's guarded disclosures respecting the court of James. Clarendon has displayed great ability both in what he has told and in what he has left untold. Those who impute this to a fondness f©r mystery, forget that Clarendon's History and his Life, taken together, may be truly viewed as an elaborate defence of the Stuarts, conducted in a manner very creditable to Clarendon's skill as an advocate. The case resembled those cases in which the characters of "personages" are involved, and in which the most consummate advocates at the bar are retained with the highest fees. The fee which Clarendon ultimately received was a large one; but it was earned by the tact and adroitness of the advocate in marshalling the strong points of his case and keeping the weak points out of sight.

What a strange story for instance, is half revealed, half kept in sombre shadow, in his History, taken together with what he lets out in his Life,