Excerpt from The Life of Daniel Defoe As in my Life of William Cowper, I have not despised trifles, and for tfle reason that I believe, with Sir leigh, that Even by trifles are the qualit t persons as well disclosed as by their great actions, because in matters of im portance they commonly strain themselves to the observance of general commended rules; in lesser things they follow the current of their own natures. 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.