Tracts, legal and historical

77
the reverse would be unnatural, and contrary to hu-
man experience. There is no doubt that Lewis the
Sixteenth actually fled to Varennes, and the fact, and
its unfortunate issue, are alike indisputable ; yet it
has been strikingly remarked, that hardly one at-
tendant gives the same account of the matter, and
while there are strange discrepancies, and contradic-
tions in essential points, some detail incidents that
have escaped others, nay that are entirely suppress-
ed by them. 1 If uncertainty in this manner, prevails
among immediate spectators, it must hold, a fortiori,
in collateral, and hearsay testimony.
Imposture was extremely common in the four-
teenth century, it was indeed the fcible and illusion
of the age. We moreover learn from an old chro-
nicle, that " John Tanner sayde he wes King Edward
the I. sunne, 2 so taught by a Dyvile that promised
hym to be King." — So ambitious and evil-minded
this person was, it however adds, " but at last he
was hangid at Northampton." 3 The instance too of
Maudelain is in point, and if he had not fortunately
been dispatched in the same way, he would have
troubled us with the refutation of another theory as
tenable as the one we have been engaged in dis-
cussing. It is rather singular, that much about the
same time there should have been, if we may so ex-
1 See the various and interesting French pamphlets that have
been written in this controversy.
2 i. e. Edward the First's son.
3 Lei. Coll. Vol. II. p. 473.