Page:The Constitutions and Other Select Documents Illustrative of the History of France, 1789-1907, Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged.pdf/9

Rh purpose documents are perhaps less effective than contemporary narratives. Yet there are many exceptions. Several of the documents not otherwise of the highest worth have been included for their value in this particular.

Most of the documents in this collection will serve several of these purposes, but the superior value of a document for but one of these is often the decisive reason for its inclusion.

The brevity of the introductions has made it necessary that I should confine myself to pointing out only a very few of the ways in which the documents are of interest. In some cases I regret that the plan has not made possible more extended comment, but in general I believe that as much has been furnished the student as he can profitably receive. He needs to be started, but he should not be told all of the things to be obtained from the document. In the furnishing of data I have tried to supply such information as is indispensable for the understanding of the document, provided it is not to be found in the document itself. The references have been purposely confined to a limited number of well known works, all of which are in English or in French. By this method I believe that all students who use the book may be induced to become quite familiar with nearly all of the works in English and, if they read any French, with the few French works cited. To have given more, I fear, would have defeated this purpose.

I am greatly indebted to Mrs. Helen Dresser Fling, to the editors of the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, and to the editors of that admirable series issued by the history department of the University of Pennsylvania, Translation and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, for permission to employ their excellent translation wherever I have had occasion to use a document that has already appeared in their publications. In using these translations, as well as a number of others from non-copyrighted sources, I have made separate acknowledgment in every instance and have reproduced them exactly as printed, excepting some slight typographical errors and a few changes kindly supplied by Mrs. Fling. In my own translations I have striven to be as literal as possible, having a decent regard for the idioms of the English language. Probably I have been more literal than was absolutely requisite, but have believed that the translator of documents should