There was nothing to ensure a fair trial for the victims of a royal prosecution, and testimony obtained by torture was accepted as authentic.

All these are facts, and to neglect them is to go astray.
But they do not prove that every public document is untrustworthy; or that the words of a statute have no more to do with reality than the words of a romance.

It is a question of degree.

Historical narrative could not be written under the conditions most properly imposed upon criminal proceedings in a court of law.

If nothing which cannot be proved beyond the possibility of reasonable doubt is admitted into the pages of history, they will be bare indeed.