One edition passes into another, and that into a third, and so on, till we come to that volume we peruse at present.

There is no variation in the steps.

After we know one we know all of them; and after we have made one, we can have no scruple as to the rest.

This circumstance alone preserves the evidence of history, and will perpetuate the memory of the present age to the latest posterity.

If all the long chain of causes and effects, which connect any past event with any volume of history, were composed of parts different from each other, and which it were necessary for the mind distinctly to conceive, it is impossible we should preserve to the end any belief or evidence.