Teacher's Professional Library

Edited by NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER

The Teaching of History

The War in the Balkans

Can be followed by using the New
McKinley Wall Outline
Map of the

Balkan Regions

Keep a copy on the wall before the class and mark the events in colors.

Single copies, 20 cents (postage, 10 cents extra); in quantities, as low as 15 cents each.

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Wall Outline Maps

McKinley Publishing Company

PHILADELPHIA

Volume VII. Number 1.

It were far better, as things now stand," says Professor Dicey in his brilliant book on "The Law of the Constitution," " to be charged with heresy than to fall under the suspicion of lacking historical: mindedness." The high popular appreciation of the subject which is implied in this saying is flattering to the professional historian, but doubts intrude. Our colleagues love to cite to us on occasion that dictum of Sainte Beuve that "History is in great part a set of fables which people have agreed to believe in; and we are regaled also with the story of the great Whig leader who, when retired from politics, called for something to read "anything but his tory," said he, "for history must be false." Lack of historical-mindedness may be an intellectual crime, but a true appreciation of the nature of history and of its methods-still more, a constant and correct application of these in the discussion of problems of current politics-is the rarest of virtues, and one not always displayed by professional historians themselves. A discussion, therefore, of the nature of this subject, and the materials and processes of the historical student, may not be altogether impertinent, Let it be understood at the outset, however, that I have little to offer you of my own. This whole paper may be described as merely a rehash of principles laid down in the well-known manuals of Bernheim, of Langlois and Seignobos, and of other writers on historical methodology.

First, then, as to the nature of history. Here, I think, is the great stumbling-block, not only for the laity, but for the old-fashioned historians as well. With due humility I would assert that all the definitions which make history a "record" or "narrative

of events are fundamentally wrong. They direct attention not to the content but to the vehicle of the subject; to the outer husk and not to the inner meat. This, I contend, is by no means an unessential matter, for it colors the whole point of view. The decision of this point determines whether history is to be accounted a branch of literature or a science; whether artistry of presentation or the veracity of the facts presented is to be reckoned the mn thing. So capable historian as Mr. Rhodes has shown himself to be in his "History of the United States from 1850," errs on this point when he comes to set down

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1 Paper read at the Gary Conference on History Teaching in the Secondary Schools, February 26, 27, 1915. Reprinted from Indiana University Bulletin, Vol. XIII, No. 10 (September, 1915), pp. 44-54.

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the qualities which make the great historian; and with him err the late Charles Francis Adams, president of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and a host of lesser lights. In their view Herodotus, Thucydides, and Tacitus are still the unsurpassed masters, because of the charm of their presentation and the vigor of their style. Despite the vast increase of historical knowledge-despite the sharpening of the historian's tools, the perfecting of his methods, and the enormously greater skill displayed in critical processes the modern historian is held less worthy than the ancient, on the ground of inferiority in the art of presenting his subject. I confess that, to me, this view seems most absurd. The zoologist of/today does not value Pliny or Buffon above modern writers on account of a possibly greater charm of style; nor are Marco Polo and Sir John Mandeville esteemed better guides than more recent travelers to the geography of Asia, because of the naive charm of their narratives. History is a body of knowledge, and literary considerations have the same weight, and no greater, in estimating the value of works dealing with it as is accorded to those relating to mathematics, astronomy, and the other sciences.

Pray, however, do not misunderstand me. No one will condemn more readily than I the slovenly writer who, through carelessness, pedantic affectation, or ignorance of his mother tongue produces an unreadable book, no matter with what field of knowledge it is concerned. Perhaps more than on most subjects, works on history, because of their concern with the facts of man's life in society, can and ought to be made easily and pleasantly readable, not only for the scholar, but for the general public also. And this union of accurate scholarship with artistic skill of presentation is by no means unknown among historians. Parkman possessed in a high degree both qualities; Dean Milman and John Richard Green are cases in point; and Macaulay, though at times biased by political prejudices, and inaccurate from too much dependence on his truly marvelous memory, was a shining example of the combination of vast historical erudition with a captivating style. The point which wish to make is merely this: that style can save no mar, and (in the words of Professor Masson, the author of the monumental life of Milton), "History without accuracy is a sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal." It is for this reason that Hume, Rollin, and Ridrath are numbered among the historically damned; that Froude, Thierry, and Fiske wander in the limbo of the uncondemned yet unredeemed; and

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