Few problems are more vexing for the intellectual biographer than the problem of attribution. In Goodwin's case, more than a dozen anonymous works have been attributed to him by contemporaries or by modern scholars. The anonymous works vary in length and significance, but in many cases their identification makes a difference to the way we tell Goodwin's story.

Broadly speaking, we can adduce two types of evidence in our attempt to ascertain authorship. External evidence includes any contemporary attribution of authorship, whether by another pamphleteer, a diarist or informant, or a reader who wrote the name of the supposed author on their own copy. In a number of cases discussed below, there is no such evidence available. Even where it is available, one cannot automatically assume that the contemporary attribution is accurate. Internal evidence includes vocabulary and phraseology; concepts and ideas; the printer and publisher of the work; and incidental references to people, places, books or events. One can ask whether a pamphlet bears a close stylistic resemblance to other writing by the author, and whether it contains characteristic ideas and expressions familiar from his other works.

Having analysed the dozen or so anonymous works attributed to Goodwin, I have tried to assess the likelihood of his authorship, assisted by the standard reference works of Wing and Halkett/Laing. Since I have not ‘arriv'd at the beautiful haven of infallibilitie’, my judgements are open to revision in the light of fresh evidence or a different assessment of the existing data.