Let them cry out, let them write, let them print, let them sign--they are not listened to.

These utterances are inscribed in bronze; the poor fellows remain historical and sublime in spite of themselves.

And I do not find that all this is done in the ages of barbarism alone; it is still going on, and it molds the history of yesterday to the taste of public opinion--a Muse tyrannical and capricious, which preserves the general purport and scorns detail.
Which of you knows not of such transformation?
Do you not see with your own eyes the chrysalis fact assume by degrees the wings of fiction?
Half formed by the necessities of the time, a fact is hidden in the ground obscure and incomplete, rough, misshapen, like a block of marble not yet rough-hewn.

The first who unearth it, and take it in hand, would wish it differently shaped, and pass it, already a little rounded, into other hands; others polish it as they pass it along; in a short time it is exhibited transformed into an immortal statue.

We disclaim it; witnesses who have seen and heard pile refutations upon explanations; the learned investigate, pore over books, and write.