PREFACE.
Comparatively little has been written about the life of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin. The two chief authorities upon the subject are William Godwin and Mr. C. Kegan Paul. In writing the following Biography I have relied chiefly upon the Memoir written by the former, and the Life of Godwin and Prefatory Memoir to the Letters to Imlay of the latter. I have endeavoured to supplement the facts recorded in these books by a careful analysis of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin's writings and study of the period in which she lived.
I must here express my thanks to Dr. Richard Garnett, and to Mr. C. Kegan Paul, for the kind assistance they have given me in my work. To the first-named of these gentlemen I am indebted for the loan of a manuscript containing some particulars of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin's last illness which have never yet appeared in print, and to the latter for the gift, as well as the loan, of several important books.
