Excerpt from Paddington: Past and Present History is valuable, not merely for the facts which it records, but in a much higher degree for the lessons it teaches; for the Future will be benefited by the Past and the Present, more in proportion to the amount of truth developed and error eradicated by their teaching, than by the number of circumstances preserved. To judge of the facts of history, it is necessary to have the liberty to know them; but it has often hap pened that historical facts have been so discreditable to the actors of the history, that the facts have been hidden, and fiction put in their place; and liberty to know has been refused to all, except the few who were to become participators in the actions. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.