Excerpt from Renascence PortraitsFor this book is addressed to the ordinary reader and the writer frankly confesses a desire to be interesting. And though he is willing to plead guilty at once to a charge of dismal failure he insists upon a claim to credit for good intentions. Such a claim, however hum ble it may seem, is in reality a little bold. For a desire to be interesting in writing history is regarded by a number of historians as distinctly out of date. A school, which until recently threatened to become dominant, assures us that a writer on history has no more reason for trying to be interesting to the average reader of books than a writer on mathematics. One of them is credibly reported to have thanked God he had no style to tempt him out of the straight and narrow path of scientific exactness.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis 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.