Excerpt from The Wars of Religion in France 1559-1576: The Huguenots Catherine De Medici, and Philip II No one acquainted with the history of historical writing can have failed to observe how transitory are its achievements. Mark Pattison's aphorism that history is one of the most ephemeral forms of literature has much of truth in it. The reasons of this are not far to seek. In the first place, the most laborious historian is doomed to be sup erszded in course of time by the accumulation of new material. In the second place, the point of view and the interpretation of one generation varies from that which preceded it, so that each generation requires a rewriting of history in terms of its own interest. These reasons must be my excuse for venturing to write a new book upon an old subject. It is now nearly thirty years since the appearance of the late Professor Henry M. Baird's excellent work, The Rise of the H ngnenots (new York, and little that is comprehensive has since been written upon the subject in English, with the exception of Mr. A. W. Whitehead's admirable Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France (london, But the limita tions imposed by biographical history compel an author inevitably to ignore movements or events not germane to his immediate subject, which, nevertheless, may be of great importance for gen eral history. Moreover, a biography is limited by the term of life of the hero, and his death may not by any means terminate the issue in which he was a factor - as indeed was the case with Coligny. 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.