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This people, in a sense, was an ignorant people.
Those of the highest rank were well and laboriously educated according
to the contemporary
standard; but the rank and file paid no attention to learning. They
neither read, wrote, nor
thought. One today is astonished at the ignorance of the then common
people concerning public affairs. Compare a history like Holinshed's
with a history like Fronde's or Grardiner's. You find in the former no
exposition of principles, no attempt to sift tradition from fact, no
sense whatever of the dignity of a thousand page folio in black letter.
On the other hand, we read in Holinshed of a terrible storm that killed a
dog in
Essex, or of a cow that gave birth to a five-legged calf in Kent. Street
parades, tiltings, trivial and momentous events alternately, mere
gossip, above all, inspired utterances in the form of public
proclamations from the crown — this is the sum and substance of
Holinshed and Stow — and the people were well satisfied.
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