History of the Peninsular War (Complete‪)‬

The late war in the Peninsula will be memorable above all of modern times. It stands alone for the perfidiousness with which the French commenced it, and the atrocious system upon which they carried it on. The circumstances of the resistance are not less extraordinary than those of the aggression, whether we consider the total disorganization to which the kingdom of Spain was reduced; the inveterate abuses which had been entailed upon it by the imbecility, misrule, and dotage, of its old despotism; the inexperience, the weakness, and the errors, of the successive governments which grew out of the necessities of the times; or the unexampled patriotism and endurance of the people, which bore them through these complicated disadvantages. There are few portions of history from which lessons of such political importance are to be deduced; none which can more powerfully and permanently excite the sympathy of mankind, because of the mighty interests at stake. For this was no common war, of which a breach of treaty, an extension of frontier, a distant colony, or a disputed succession, serves as the cause or pretext: it was as direct a contest between the principles of good and evil as the elder Persians, or the Manicheans, imagined in their fables: it was for the life or death of national independence, national spirit, and of all those holy feelings which are comprehended in the love of our native land. Nor was it for the Peninsula alone that the war was waged: it was for England and for Europe; for literature and for liberty; for domestic morals and domestic happiness; for the vital welfare of the human race. Therefore I have thought that I could not better fulfil my duties to mankind, and especially to my own country, nor more fitly employ the leisure wherewith God has blessed me, nor endeavour in any worthier manner to transmit my name to future ages, than by composing, with all diligence, the faithful history of this momentous struggle. To this resolution I have been incited, as an Englishman, by the noble part which England has borne in these events; and as an individual, by the previous course of my studies, which, during the greater part of my life, have been so directed, that the annals and the literature of Spain and Portugal have become to me almost as familiar as our own. It is not strange, then, that having thus, as it were, intellectually naturalized myself in those countries, I should have watched them with the liveliest interest through their dreadful trial: and being thus prepared for the task, having some local knowledge of the scene of action, rich in accumulated materials, and possessing access to the best and highest sources of information, I undertake it cheerfully; fully assured that the principles herein to be inculcated and exemplified are established upon the best and surest foundation, and that nations can be secure and happy only in proportion as they adhere to them.