A LECTURE ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY

 MACMILLAN AND CO. , LIMITED LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA MELBOURNE

 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO

 THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. TORONTO

 A LECTURE ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY

 _DELIVERED AT CAMBRIDGE, JUNE 11, 1895_

 BY

 LORD ACTON LL. D. , D. C. L. REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY

 MACMILLAN AND CO. , LIMITED ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON 1911

 RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, LIMITED, BRUNSWICK STREET, STAMFORD STREET, S. E. , AND BUNGAY, SUFFOLK

 _First Edition, October, 1895. Second Edition, January, 1896. Reprinted, 1905, 1911. _

FELLOW STUDENTS, I look back to-day to a time before the middle of the century, when Iwas reading at Edinburgh, and fervently wishing to come to thisUniversity. At three colleges I applied for admission, and, as thingsthen were, I was refused by all. Here, from the first, I vainly fixedmy hopes, and here, in a happier hour, after five-and-forty years, they are at last fulfilled. 

[Sidenote: UNITY OF MODERN HISTORY]

I desire first to speak to you of that which I may reasonably call theUnity of Modern History, as an easy approach to questions necessaryto be met on the threshold by any one occupying this place, which mypredecessor has made so formidable to me by the reflected lustre ofhis name. 

You have often heard it said that Modern History is a subject to whichneither beginning nor end can be assigned. No beginning, because thedense web of the fortunes of man is woven without a void; because, insociety as in nature, the structure is continuous, and we can tracethings back uninterruptedly, until we dimly descry the Declaration ofIndependence in the forests of Germany. No end, because, on the sameprinciple, history made and history making are scientificallyinseparable and separately unmeaning. 

[Sidenote: LINK BETWEEN HISTORY AND POLITICS]

“Politics, ” said Sir John Seeley, “are vulgar when they are notliberalised by history, and history fades into mere literature whenit loses sight of its relation to practical politics. ” Everybodyperceives the sense in which this is true. For the science of politicsis the one science that is deposited by the stream of history, likegrains of gold in the sand of a river; and the knowledge of the past, the record of truths revealed by experience, is eminently practical, as an instrument of action, and a power that goes to the making of thefuture. [1] In France, such is the weight attached to the study of ourown time, that there is an appointed course of contemporary history, with appropriate textbooks. [2] That is a chair which, in theprogressive division of labour by which both science and governmentprosper, [3] may some day be founded in this country. Meantime, we dowell to acknowledge the points at which the two epochs diverge. Forthe contemporary differs from the modern in this, that many of itsfacts cannot by us be definitely ascertained. The living do not giveup their secrets with the candour of the dead; one key is alwaysexcepted, and a generation passes before we can ensure accuracy. Common report and outward seeming are bad copies of the reality, asthe initiated know it. Even of a thing so memorable as the war of1870, the true cause is still obscure; much that we believed has beenscattered to the winds in the last six months, and further revelationsby important witnesses are about to appear. The use of history turnsfar more on certainty than on abundance of acquired information. 

Beyond the question of certainty is the question of detachment. Theprocess by which principles are discovered and appropriated is otherthan that by which, in practice, they are applied; and our most sacredand disinterested convictions ought to take shape in the tranquilregions of the air, above the tumult and the tempest of activelife. [4] For a man is justly despised who has one opinion in historyand another in politics, one for abroad and another at home, one foropposition and another for office. History compels us to fasten onabiding issues, and rescues us from the temporary and transient. Politics and history are interwoven, but are not commensurate. Ours isa domain that reaches farther than affairs of state, and is notsubject to the jurisdiction of governments. It is our function to keepin view and to command the movement of ideas, which are not theeffect but the cause of public events;[5] and even to allow somepriority to ecclesiastical history over civil, since, by reason of thegraver issues concerned, and the vital consequences of error, itopened the way in research, and was the first to be treated by closereasoners and scholars of the higher rank. [6]

[Sidenote: NOT GOVERNED BY NATIONAL CAUSES]

In the same manner, there is wisdom and depth in the philosophy whichalways considers the origin and the germ, and glories in history asone consistent epic. [7] Yet every student ought to know that masteryis acquired by resolved limitation. And confusion ensues from thetheory of Montesquieu and of his school, who, adapting the same termto things unlike, insist that freedom is the primitive condition ofthe race from which we are sprung. [8] If we are to account mind notmatter, ideas not force, the spiritual property that gives dignity, and grace, and intellectual value to history, and its action on theascending life of man, then we shall not be prone to explain theuniversal by the national, and civilisation by custom. [9] A speech ofAntigone, a single sentence of Socrates, a few lines that wereinscribed on an Indian rock before the Second Punic War, the footstepsof a silent yet prophetic people who dwelt by the Dead Sea, andperished in the fall of Jerusalem, come nearer to our lives than theancestral wisdom of barbarians who fed their swine on the Hercynianacorns. 

[Sidenote: MEDIÆVAL LIMIT OF MODERN HISTORY]

For our present purpose, then, I describe as modern history that whichbegins four hundred years ago, which is marked off by an evident andintelligible line from the time immediately preceding, and displaysin its course specific and distinctive characteristics of its own. [10]The modern age did not proceed from the mediæval by normal succession, with outward tokens of legitimate descent. Unheralded, it founded anew order of things, under a law of innovation, sapping the ancientreign of continuity. In those days Columbus subverted the notions ofthe world, and reversed the conditions of production, wealth andpower; in those days, Machiavelli released government from therestraint of law; Erasmus diverted the current of ancient learningfrom profane into Christian channels; Luther broke the chain ofauthority and tradition at the strongest link; and Copernicus erectedan invincible power that set for ever the mark of progress upon thetime that was to come. There is the same unbound originality anddisregard for inherited sanctions in the rare philosophers as in thediscovery of Divine Right, and the intruding Imperialism of Rome. Thelike effects are visible everywhere, and one generation beheld themall. It was an awakening of new life; the world revolved in adifferent orbit, determined by influences unknown before. After manyages persuaded of the headlong decline and impending dissolution ofsociety, [11] and governed by usage and the will of masters who were intheir graves, the sixteenth century went forth armed for untriedexperience, and ready to watch with hopefulness a prospect ofincalculable change. 

[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF KNOWLEDGE ON MODERN HISTORY]

That forward movement divides it broadly from the older world; and theunity of the new is manifest in the universal spirit of investigationand discovery which did not cease to operate, and withstood therecurring efforts of reaction, until, by the advent of the reign ofgeneral ideas which we call the Revolution, it at lengthprevailed. [12] This successive deliverance and gradual passage, forgood and evil, from subordination to independence is a phenomenon ofprimary import to us, because historical science has been one of itsinstruments. [13] If the Past has been an obstacle and a burden, knowledge of the Past is the safest and the surest emancipation. Andthe earnest search for it is one of the signs that distinguish thefour centuries of which I speak from those that went before. Themiddle ages, which possessed good writers of contemporary narrative, were careless and impatient of older fact. They became content to bedeceived, to live in a twilight of fiction, under clouds of falsewitness, inventing according to convenience, and glad to welcome theforger and the cheat. [14] As time went on, the atmosphere ofaccredited mendacity thickened, until, in the Renaissance, the art ofexposing falsehood dawned upon keen Italian minds. It was then thathistory as we understand it began to be understood, and theillustrious dynasty of scholars arose to whom we still look both formethod and material. Unlike the dreaming prehistoric world, ours knowsthe need and the duty to make itself master of the earlier times, andto forfeit nothing of their wisdom or their warnings, [15] and hasdevoted its best energy and treasure to the sovereign purpose ofdetecting error and vindicating entrusted truth. [16]

[Sidenote: INTERNATIONAL IDEAS]

[Sidenote: MEMORABLE MEN]

[Sidenote: INDEPENDENT MINDS]

In this epoch of full-grown history men have not acquiesced in thegiven conditions of their lives. Taking little for granted they havesought to know the ground they stand on, and the road they travel, andthe reason why. Over them, therefore, the historian has obtained anincreasing ascendancy. [17] The law of stability was overcome by thepower of ideas, constantly varied and rapidly renewed;[18] ideas thatgive life and motion, that take wing and traverse seas and frontiers, making it futile to pursue the consecutive order of events in theseclusion of a separate nationality. [19] They compel us to share theexistence of societies wider than our own, to be familiar with distantand exotic types, to hold our march upon the loftier summits, alongthe central range, to live in the company of heroes, and saints, andmen of genius, that no single country could produce. We cannot affordwantonly to lose sight of great men and memorable lives, and are boundto store up objects for admiration as far as may be;[20] for theeffect of implacable research is constantly to reduce their number. Nointellectual exercise, for instance, can be more invigorating than towatch the working of the mind of Napoleon, the most entirely known aswell as the ablest of historic men. In another sphere, it is thevision of a higher world to be intimate with the character of Fénelon, the cherished model of politicians, ecclesiastics, and men of letters, the witness against one century and precursor of another, the advocateof the poor against oppression, of liberty in an age of arbitrarypower, of tolerance in an age of persecution, of the humane virtuesamong men accustomed to sacrifice them to authority, the man of whomone enemy says that his cleverness was enough to strike terror, andanother, that genius poured in torrents from his eyes. For the mindsthat are greatest and best alone furnish the instructive examples. Aman of ordinary proportion or inferior metal knows not how to thinkout the rounded circle of his thought, how to divest his will of itssurroundings and to rise above the pressure of time and race andcircumstance, [21] to choose the star that guides his course, tocorrect, and test, and assay his convictions by the light within, [22]and, with a resolute conscience and ideal courage, to re-model andreconstitute the character which birth and education gave him. [23]

[Sidenote: FOREIGN CONSTITUTIONS]

For ourselves, if it were not the quest of the higher level and theextended horizon, international history would be imposed by theexclusive and insular reason that parliamentary reporting is youngerthan parliaments. The foreigner has no mystic fabric in hisgovernment, and no _arcanum imperii_. For him, the foundations havebeen laid bare; every motive and function of the mechanism isaccounted for as distinctly as the works of a watch. But with ourindigenous constitution, not made with hands or written upon paper, but claiming to develope by a law of organic growth; with ourdisbelief in the virtue of definitions and general principles and ourreliance on relative truths, we can have nothing equivalent to thevivid and prolonged debates in which other communities have displayedthe inmost secrets of political science to every man who can read. And the discussions of constituent assemblies, at Philadelphia, Versailles and Paris, at Cadiz and Brussels, at Geneva, Frankfort andBerlin, above nearly all, those of the most enlightened States in theAmerican Union, when they have recast their institutions, areparamount in the literature of politics, and proffer treasures whichat home we have never enjoyed. 

[Sidenote: RESOURCES OF MODERN HISTORY]

[Sidenote: BEGINNING OF THE DOCUMENTARY AGE]

To historians the later part of their enormous subject is preciousbecause it is inexhaustible. It is the best to know because it is thebest known and the most explicit. Earlier scenes stand out from abackground of obscurity. We soon reach the sphere of hopelessignorance and unprofitable doubt. But hundreds and even thousands ofthe moderns have borne testimony against themselves, and may bestudied in their private correspondence and sentenced on their ownconfession. Their deeds are done in the daylight. Every country opensits archives and invites us to penetrate the mysteries of State. WhenHallam wrote his chapter on James II. , France was the only Power whosereports were available. Rome followed, and the Hague; and then camethe stores of the Italian States, and at last the Prussian and theAustrian papers, and partly those of Spain. Where Hallam and Lingardwere dependent on Barillon, their successors consult the diplomacy often governments. The topics indeed are few on which the resources havebeen so employed that we can be content with the work done for us, andnever wish it to be done over again. Part of the lives of Luther andFrederic, a little of the Thirty Years' War, much of the AmericanRevolution and the French Restoration, the early years of Richelieuand Mazarin, and a few volumes of Mr. Gardiner, show here and therelike Pacific islands in the ocean. I should not even venture to claimfor Ranke, the real originator of the heroic study of records, and themost prompt and fortunate of European pathfinders, that there is oneof his seventy volumes that has not been overtaken and in partsurpassed. It is through his accelerating influence mainly that ourbranch of study has become progressive, so that the best master isquickly distanced by the better pupil. [24] The Vatican archives alone, now made accessible to the world, filled 3, 239 cases when they weresent to France; and they are not the richest. We are still at thebeginning of the documentary age, which will tend to make historyindependent of historians, to develope learning at the expense ofwriting, and to accomplish a revolution in other sciences as well. [25]

[Sidenote: MODERN HISTORY]

To men in general I would justify the stress I am laying on modernhistory, neither by urging its varied wealth, nor the rupture withprecedent, nor the perpetuity of change and increase of pace, nor thegrowing predominance of opinion over belief, and of knowledge overopinion, but by the argument that it is a narrative told of ourselves, the record of a life which is our own, of efforts not yet abandoned torepose, of problems that still entangle the feet and vex the hearts ofmen. Every part of it is weighty with inestimable lessons that wemust learn by experience and at a great price, if we know not how toprofit by the example and teaching of those who have gone before us, in a society largely resembling the one we live in. [26] Its studyfulfils its purpose even if it only makes us wiser, without producingbooks, and gives us the gift of historical thinking, which is betterthan historical learning. [27] It is a most powerful ingredient in theformation of character and the training of talent, and our historicaljudgments have as much to do with hopes of heaven as public or privateconduct. Convictions that have been strained through the instances andthe comparisons of modern times differ immeasurably in solidity andforce from those which every new fact perturbs, and which are oftenlittle better than illusions or unsifted prejudice. [28]

[Sidenote: A SCHOOL OF OPINION]

[Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF THE RELIGIOUS ELEMENT]

The first of human concerns is religion, and it is the salient featureof the modern centuries. They are signalised as the scene ofProtestant developments. Starting from a time of extreme indifference, ignorance, and decline, they were at once occupied with that conflictwhich was to rage so long, and of which no man could imagine theinfinite consequences. Dogmatic conviction—for I shun to speak offaith in connection with many characters of those days—dogmaticconviction rose to be the centre of universal interest, and remaineddown to Cromwell the supreme influence and motive of public policy. Atime came when the intensity of prolonged conflict, when even theenergy of antagonistic assurance, abated somewhat, and thecontroversial spirit began to make room for the scientific; and as thestorm subsided, and the area of settled questions emerged, much ofthe dispute was abandoned to the serene and soothing touch ofhistorians, invested as they are with the prerogative of redeeming thecause of religion from many unjust reproaches, and from the graverevil of reproaches that are just. Ranke used to say that Churchinterests prevailed in politics until the Seven Years' War, and markeda phase of society that ended when the hosts of Brandenburg went intoaction at Leuthen, chanting their Lutheran hymns. [29] That boldproposition would be disputed even if applied to the present age. After Sir Robert Peel had broken up his party, the leaders whofollowed him declared that no-popery was the only basis on which itcould be reconstructed. [30] On the other side may be urged that, inJuly 1870, at the outbreak of the French war, the only governmentthat insisted on the abolition of the temporal power was Austria; andsince then we have witnessed the fall of Castelar, because heattempted to reconcile Spain with Rome. 

[Sidenote: RELIGION]

Soon after 1850 several of the most intelligent men in France, struckby the arrested increase of their own population and by the tellingstatistics from Further Britain, foretold the coming preponderance ofthe English race. They did not foretell, what none could then foresee, the still more sudden growth of Prussia, or that the three mostimportant countries of the globe would, by the end of the century, bethose that chiefly belonged to the conquests of the Reformation. Sothat in Religion, as in so many things, the product of thesecenturies has favoured the new elements; and the centre of gravity, moving from the Mediterranean nations to the Oceanic, from the Latinto the Teuton, has also passed from the Catholic to theProtestant. [31]

[Sidenote: THE CAUSE OF LIBERTY]

[Sidenote: REVOLUTION]

Out of these controversies proceeded political as well as historicalscience. It was in the Puritan phase, before the restoration of theStuarts, that theology, blending with politics, effected a fundamentalchange. The essentially English reformation of the seventeenth centurywas less a struggle between churches than between sects, oftensubdivided by questions of discipline and self-regulation rather thanby dogma. The sectaries cherished no purpose or prospect of prevailingover the nations; and they were concerned with the individual morethan with the congregation, with conventicles, not withstate-churches. Their view was narrowed, but their sight wassharpened. It appeared to them that governments and institutions aremade to pass away, like things of earth, whilst souls are immortal;that there is no more proportion between liberty and power thanbetween eternity and time; that, therefore, the sphere of enforcedcommand ought to be restricted within fixed limits, and that which hadbeen done by authority, and outward discipline, and organisedviolence, should be attempted by division of power, and committed tothe intellect and the conscience of free men. [32] Thus was exchangedthe dominion of will over will for the dominion of reason over reason. The true apostles of toleration are not those who sought protectionfor their own beliefs, or who had none to protect; but men to whom, irrespective of their cause, it was a political, a moral, and atheological dogma, a question of conscience, involving both religionand policy. [33] Such a man was Socinus; and others arose in thesmaller sects—the Independent founder of the colony of Rhode Island, and the Quaker patriarch of Pennsylvania. Much of the energy and zealwhich had laboured for authority of doctrine was employed for libertyof prophesying. The air was filled with the enthusiasm of a new cry;but the cause was still the same. It became a boast that religion wasthe mother of freedom, that freedom was the lawful off spring ofreligion; and this transmutation, this subversion of established formsof political life by the development of religious thought, brings usto the heart of my subject, to the significant and central feature ofthe historic cycle before us. Beginning with the strongest religiousmovement and the most refined despotism ever known, it has led to thesuperiority of politics over divinity in the life of nations, andterminates in the equal claim of every man to be unhindered by man inthe fulfilment of duty to God[34]—a doctrine laden with storm andhavoc, which is the secret essence of the Rights of Man, and theindestructible soul of Revolution. 

[Sidenote: THE MODE OF LIBERTY]

[Sidenote: PROGRESS]

[Sidenote: THE MARK OF PROVIDENCE]

When we consider what the adverse forces were, their sustainedresistance, their frequent recovery, the critical moments when thestruggle seemed for ever desperate, in 1685, in 1772, in 1808, it isno hyperbole to say that the progress of the world towardsself-government would have been arrested but for the strength affordedby the religious motive in the seventeenth century. And thisconstancy of progress, of progress in the direction of organised andassured freedom, is the characteristic fact of modern history, and itstribute to the theory, of Providence. [35] Many persons, I am wellassured, would detect that this is a very old story, and a trivialcommonplace, and would challenge proof that the world is makingprogress in aught but intellect, that it is gaining in freedom, orthat increase in freedom is either a progress or a gain. Ranke, whowas my own master, rejected the view that I have stated;[36] Comte, the master of better men, believed that we drag a lengthening chainunder the gathered weight of the dead hand;[37] and many of our recentclassics, Carlyle, Newman, Froude, were persuaded that there is noprogress justifying the ways of God to man, and that the mereconsolidation of liberty is like the motion of creatures whose advanceis in the direction of their tails. They deem that anxious precautionagainst bad government is an obstruction to good, and degradesmorality and mind by placing the capable at the mercy of theincapable, dethroning enlightened virtue for the benefit of theaverage man. They hold that great and salutary things are done formankind by power concentrated, not by power balanced and cancelled anddispersed, and that the whig theory, sprung from decomposing sects, the theory that authority is legitimate only by virtue of its checks, and that the sovereign is dependent on the subject, is rebellionagainst the divine will manifested all down the stream of time. 

[Sidenote: CERTAINTY]

[Sidenote: DEPENDENT ON RESERVE]

I state the objection not that we may plunge into the crucialcontroversy of a science that is not identical with ours, but in orderto make my drift clear by the defining aid of express contradiction. No political dogma is as serviceable to my purpose here as thehistorian's maxim to do the best he can for the other side, and toavoid pertinacity or emphasis on his own. Like the economic precept_Laissez-faire_[38] which the eighteenth century derived from Colbert, it has been an important, if not a final step in the making of method. The strongest and most impressive personalities, it is true, likeMacaulay, Thiers, and the two greatest of living writers, Mommsen andTreitschke, project their own broad shadow upon their pages. This is apractice proper to great men, and a great man may be worth severalimmaculate historians. Otherwise there is virtue in the saying that ahistorian is seen at his best when he does not appear. [39] Better forus is the example of the Bishop of Oxford, who never lets us know whathe thinks of anything but the matter before him; and of hisillustrious French rival, Fustel de Coulanges, who said to an excitedaudience: “Do not imagine you are listening to me; it is historyitself that speaks. ”[40] We can found no philosophy on the observationof four hundred years, excluding three thousand. It would be animperfect and a fallacious induction. But I hope that even this narrowand disedifying section of history will aid you to see that the actionof Christ who is risen on mankind whom he redeemed fails not, butincreases;[41] that the wisdom of divine rule appears not in theperfection but in the improvement of the world;[42] and that achievedliberty is the one ethical result that rests on the converging andcombined conditions of advancing civilisation. [43] Then you willunderstand what a famous philosopher said, that History is the truedemonstration of Religion. [44]

[Sidenote: MEANING OF LIBERTY]

But what do people mean who proclaim that liberty is the palm, and theprize, and the crown, seeing that it is an idea of which there are twohundred definitions, and that this wealth of interpretation has causedmore bloodshed than anything, except theology? Is it Democracy as inFrance, or Federalism as in America, or the national independencewhich bounds the Italian view, or the reign of the fittest, which isthe ideal of Germans?[45] I know not whether it will ever fall withinmy sphere of duty to trace the slow progress of that idea through thechequered scenes of our history, and to describe how subtlespeculations touching the nature of conscience promoted a nobler andmore spiritual conception of the liberty that protects it, [46] untilthe guardian of rights developed into the guardian of duties which arethe cause of rights, [47] and that which had been prized as thematerial safeguard for treasures of earth became sacred as securityfor things that are divine. All that we require is a workday key tohistory, and our present need can be supplied without pausing tosatisfy philosophers. Without inquiring how far Sarasa or Butler, Kantor Vinet, is right as to the infallible voice of God in man, we mayeasily agree in this, that where absolutism reigned, by irresistiblearms, concentrated possessions, auxiliary churches, and inhuman laws, it reigns no more; that commerce having risen against land, labouragainst wealth, the state against the forces dominant in society, [48]the division of power against the state, the thought of individualsagainst the practice of ages, neither authorities, nor minorities, normajorities can command implicit obedience; and, where there has beenlong and arduous experience, a rampart of tried conviction andaccumulated knowledge, [49] where there is a fair level of generalmorality, education, courage, and self-restraint, there, if thereonly, a society may be found that exhibits the condition of lifetowards which, by elimination of failures, the world has been movingthrough the allotted space. [50] You will know it by outward signs:Representation, the extinction of slavery, the reign of opinion, andthe like; better still by less apparent evidences: the security of theweaker groups[51] and the liberty of conscience, which, effectuallysecured, secures the rest. 

[Sidenote: THE GROWTH OF REVOLUTION]

[Sidenote: RENOVATION OF HISTORY BY REVOLUTION]

Here we reach a point at which my argument threatens to abut on acontradiction. If the supreme conquests of society are won more oftenby violence than by lenient arts, if the trend and drift of things istowards convulsions and catastrophes, [52] if the world owes religiousliberty to the Dutch Revolution, constitutional government to theEnglish, federal republicanism to the American, political equality tothe French and its successors, [53] what is to become of us, docile andattentive students of the absorbing Past? The triumph of theRevolutionist annuls the historian. [54] By its authentic exponents, Jefferson and Sieyès, the Revolution of the last century repudiateshistory. Their followers renounced acquaintance with it, and wereready to destroy its records and to abolish its inoffensiveprofessors. But the unexpected truth, stranger than fiction, is thatthis was not the ruin but the renovation of history. Directly andindirectly, by process of development and by process of reaction, animpulse was given which made it infinitely more effectual as a factorof civilisation than ever before, and a movement began in the world ofminds which was deeper and more serious than the revival of ancientlearning. [55] The dispensation under which we live and labour consistsfirst in the recoil from the negative spirit that rejected the law ofgrowth, and partly in the endeavour to classify and adjust therevolution, and to account for it by the natural working of historiccauses. The Conservative line of writers, under the name of theRomantic or Historical School, had its seat in Germany, looked uponthe Revolution as an alien episode, the error of an age, a disease tobe treated by the investigation of its origin, and strove to unite thebroken threads and to restore the normal conditions of organicevolution. The Liberal School, whose home was France, explained andjustified the Revolution as a true development, and the ripened fruitof all history. [56] These are the two main arguments of the generationto which we owe the notion and the scientific methods that makehistory so unlike what it was to the survivors of the last century. Severally, the innovators were not superior to the men of old. Muratori was as widely read, Tillemont as accurate, Leibniz as able, Fréret as acute, Gibbon as masterly in the craft of compositeconstruction. Nevertheless, in the second quarter of this century, anew era began for historians. 

[Sidenote: USE OF UNPUBLISHED SOURCES]

[Sidenote: INSUFFICIENCY OF BOOKS]

I would point to three things in particular, out of many, whichconstitute the amended order. Of the incessant deluge of new andunsuspected matter I need say little. For some years, the secretarchives of the papacy were accessible at Paris; but the time was notripe, and almost the only man whom they availed was the archivisthimself. [57] Towards 1830 the documentary studies began on a largescale, Austria leading the way. Michelet, who claims, towards 1836, to have been the pioneer, [58] was preceded by such rivals asMackintosh, Bucholtz, and Mignet. A new and more productive periodbegan thirty years later, when the war of 1859 laid open the spoils ofItaly. Every country in succession has now allowed the exploration ofits records, and there is more fear of drowning than of drought. Theresult has been that a lifetime spent in the largest collection ofprinted books would not suffice to train a real master of modernhistory. After he had turned from literature to sources, from Burnetto Pocock, from Macaulay to Madame Campana, from Thiers to theinterminable correspondence of the Bonapartes, he would still feelinstant need of inquiry at Venice or Naples, in the Ossuna library orat the Hermitage. [59]

[Sidenote: HISTORY RENEWED BY CRITICISM]

These matters do not now concern us. For our purpose, the main thingto learn is not the art of accumulating material, but the sublimer artof investigating it, of discerning truth from falsehood, and certaintyfrom doubt. It is by solidity of criticism more than by the plenitudeof erudition, that the study of history strengthens, and straightens, and extends the mind. [60] And the accession of the critic in the placeof the indefatigable compiler, of the artist in coloured narrative, the skilled limner of character, the persuasive advocate of good, orother, causes, amounts to a transfer of government, to a change ofdynasty, in the historic realm. For the critic is one who, when helights on an interesting statement, begins by suspecting it. Heremains in suspense until he has subjected his authority to threeoperations. First, he asks whether he has read the passage as theauthor wrote it. For the transcriber, and the editor, and the officialor officious censor on the top of the editor, have played strangetricks, and have much to answer for. And if they are not to blame, itmay turn out that the author wrote his book twice over, that you candiscover the first jet, the progressive variations, things added, andthings struck out. Next is the question where the writer got hisinformation. If from a previous writer, it can be ascertained, and theinquiry has to be repeated. If from unpublished papers, they must betraced, and when the fountain head is reached, or the trackdisappears, the question of veracity arises. The responsible writer'scharacter, his position, antecedents, and probable motives have to beexamined into; and this is what, in a different and adapted sense ofthe word, may be called the higher criticism, in comparison with theservile and often mechanical work of pursuing statements to theirroot. For a historian has to be treated as a witness, and not believedunless his sincerity is established. [61] The maxim that a man must bepresumed to be innocent until his guilt is proved, was not made forhim. 

[Sidenote: CRITICAL STUDY OF EARLIER TIMES]

For us then the estimate of authorities, the weighing of testimony, ismore meritorious than the potential discovery of new matter. [62] Andmodern history, which is the widest field of application, is not thebest to learn our business in; for it is too wide, and the harvest hasnot been winnowed as in antiquity, and further on to the Crusades. Itis better to examine what has been done for questions that arecompact and circumscribed, such as the sources of Plutarch's_Pericles_, the two tracts on Athenian government, the origin of theepistle to Diognetus, the date of the life of St. Antony; and to learnfrom Schwegler how this analytical work began. More satisfying becausemore decisive has been the critical treatment of the mediæval writers, parallel with the new editions, on which incredible labour has beenlavished, and of which we have no better examples than the prefaces ofBishop Stubbs. An important event in this series was the attack onDino Compagni, which, for the sake of Dante, roused the best Italianscholars to a not unequal contest. When we are told that England isbehind the Continent in critical faculty, we must admit that this istrue as to quantity, not as to quality of work. As they are no longerliving, I will say of two Cambridge professors, Lightfoot and Hort, that they were critical scholars whom neither Frenchman nor German hassurpassed. 

[Sidenote: DEGREES OF IMPARTIALITY]

The third distinctive note of the generation of writers who dug sodeep a trench between history as known to our grandfathers and as itappears to us, is their dogma of impartiality. To an ordinary man theword means no more than justice. He considers that he may proclaim themerits of his own religion, of his prosperous and enlightened country, of his political persuasion, whether democracy, or liberal monarchy, or historic conservatism, without transgression or offence, so long ashe is fair to the relative, though inferior merits of others, andnever treats men as saints or as rogues for the side they take. Thereis no impartiality, he would say, like that of a hanging judge. Themen who, with the compass of criticism in their hands, sailed theuncharted sea of original research, proposed a different view. History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, noton opinions. They had their own notion of truthfulness, based on theexceeding difficulty of finding truth, and the still greaterdifficulty of impressing it when found. They thought it possible towrite, with so much scruple, and simplicity, and insight, as to carryalong with them every man of good will, and, whatever his feelings, tocompel his assent. Ideas which, in religion and in politics, aretruths, in history are forces. They must be respected; they must notbe affirmed. By dint of a supreme reserve, by much self-control, by atimely and discreet indifference, by secrecy in the matter of theblack cap, history might be lifted above contention, and made anaccepted tribunal, and the same for all. [63] If men were trulysincere, and delivered judgment by no canons but those of evidentmorality, then Julian would be described in the same terms byChristian and pagan, Luther by Catholic and Protestant, Washington byWhig and Tory, Napoleon by patriotic Frenchman and patrioticGerman. [64]

[Sidenote: MORALITY THE SOLE RULE OF JUDGMENT]

I speak of this school with reverence, for the good it has done, bythe assertion of historic truth and of its legitimate authority overthe minds of men. It provides a discipline which every one of us doeswell to undergo, and perhaps also well to relinquish. For it is notthe whole truth. Lanfrey's essay on Carnot, Chuquet's wars of theRevolution, Ropes's military histories, Roget's Geneva in the time ofCalvin, will supply you with examples of a more robust impartialitythan I have described. Renan calls it the luxury of an opulent andaristocratic society, doomed to vanish in an age of fierce and sordidstriving. In our universities it has a magnificent and appointedrefuge; and to serve its cause, which is sacred, because it is thecause of truth and honour, we may import a profitable lesson from thehighly unscientific region of public life. There a man does not takelong to find out that he is opposed by some who are abler and betterthan himself. And, in order to understand the cosmic force and thetrue connection of ideas, it is a source of power, and an excellentschool of principle, not to rest until, by excluding the fallacies, the prejudices, the exaggerations which perpetual contention and theconsequent precautions breed, we have made out for our opponents astronger and more impressive case than they present themselves. [65]Excepting one to which we are coming before I release you, there is noprecept less faithfully observed by historians. 

[Sidenote: EXAMPLE OF RANKE]

Ranke is the representative of the age which instituted the modernstudy of history. He taught it to be critical, to be colourless, andto be new. We meet him at every step, and he has done more for us thanany other man. There are stronger books than any one of his, and somemay have surpassed him in political, religious, philosophic insight, in vividness of the creative imagination, in originality, elevation, and depth of thought; but by the extent of important work wellexecuted, by his influence on able men, and by the amount of knowledgewhich mankind receives and employs with the stamp of his mind upon it, he stands without a rival. I saw him last in 1877, when he was feeble, sunken, and almost blind, and scarcely able to read or write. Heuttered his farewell with kindly emotion, and I feared that the next Ishould hear of him would be the news of his death. Two years later hebegan a Universal History which is not without traces of weakness, butwhich, composed after the age of eighty-three, and carried, inseventeen volumes, far into the Middle Ages, brings to a close themost astonishing career in literature. 

[Sidenote: SUPPRESSION OF OPINION]

His course had been determined, in early life, by _Quentin Durward_. The shock of the discovery that Scott's Lewis the Eleventh wasinconsistent with the original in Commynes made him resolve that hisobject thenceforth should be above all things to follow, withoutswerving, and in stern subordination and surrender, the lead of hisauthorities. He decided effectually to repress the poet, the patriot, the religious or political partisan, to sustain no cause, to banishhimself from his books, and to write nothing that would gratify hisown feelings or disclose his private convictions. [66] When a strenuousdivine who, like him, had written on the Reformation, hailed him as acomrade, Ranke repelled his advances. “You, ” he said, “are in thefirst place a Christian: I am in the first place a historian. There isa gulf between us. ”[67] He was the first eminent writer who exhibitedwhat Michelet calls _le désintéressement des morts_. It was a moraltriumph for him when he could refrain from judging, show that muchmight be said on both sides, and leave the rest to Providence. [68] Hewould have felt sympathy with the two famous London physicians of ourday, of whom it is told that they could not make up their minds on acase and reported dubiously. The head of the family insisted on apositive opinion. They answered that they were unable to give one, buthe might easily find fifty doctors who could. 

[Sidenote: CRITICISM OF MODERN SOURCES]

Niebuhr had pointed out that chroniclers who wrote before theinvention of printing generally copied one predecessor at a time, andknew little about sifting or combining authorities. The suggestionbecame luminous in Ranke's hands, and with his light and dexteroustouch he scrutinised and dissected the principal historians, fromMachiavelli to the _Mémoires d'un Homme d'État_, with a rigour neverbefore applied to moderns. But whilst Niebuhr dismissed thetraditional story, replacing it with a construction of his own, it wasRanke's mission to preserve, not to undermine, and to set up masterswhom, in their proper sphere, he could obey. The many excellentdissertations in which he displayed this art, though his successors inthe next generation matched his skill and did still more thoroughwork, are the best introduction from which we can learn the technicalprocess by which within living memory the study of modern history hasbeen renewed. Ranke's contemporaries, weary of his neutrality andsuspense, and of the useful but subordinate work that was done bybeginners who borrowed his wand, thought that too much was made ofthese obscure preliminaries which a man may accomplish for himself, inthe silence of his chamber, with less demand on the attention of thepublic. [69] That may be reasonable in men who are practised in thesefundamental technicalities. We who have to learn them, must immerseourselves in the study of the great examples. 

[Sidenote: METHOD TO BE LEARNT FROM SCIENCES]

Apart from what is technical, method is only the reduplication ofcommon sense, and is best acquired by observing its use by the ablestmen in every variety of intellectual employment. [70] Benthamacknowledged that he learned less from his own profession than fromwriters like Linnæus and Cullen; and Brougham advised the student ofLaw to begin with Dante. Liebig described his _Organic Chemistry_ asan application of ideas found in Mill's _Logic_, and a distinguishedphysician, not to be named lest he should overhear me, read threebooks to enlarge his medical mind; and they were Gibbon, Grote, andMill. He goes on to say, “An educated man cannot become so on onestudy alone, but must be brought under the influence of natural, civil, and moral modes of thought. ”[71] I quote my colleague's goldenwords in order to reciprocate them. If men of science owe anything tous, we may learn much from them that is essential. [72] For they canshow how to test proof, how to secure fulness and soundness ininduction, how to restrain and to employ with safety hypothesis andanalogy. It is they who hold the secret of the mysterious property ofthe mind by which error ministers to truth, and truth slowly butirrevocably prevails. [73] Theirs is the logic of discovery, [74] thedemonstration of the advance of knowledge and the development ofideas, which as the earthly wants and passions of men remain almostunchanged, are the charter of progress, and the vital spark inhistory. And they often give us invaluable counsel when they attend totheir own subjects and address their own people. Remember Darwin, taking note only of those passages that raised difficulties in hisway; the French philosopher complaining that his work stood still, because he found no more contradicting facts; Baer, who thinks errortreated thoroughly, nearly as remunerative as truth, by the discoveryof new objections; for, as Sir Robert Ball warns us, it is byconsidering objections that we often learn. [75] Faraday declares that“in knowledge, that man only is to be condemned and despised who isnot in a state of transition. ” And John Hunter spoke for all of us, when he said: “Never ask me what I have said or what I have written;but if you will ask me what my present opinions are, I will tell you. ”

[Sidenote: ALL ADOPT THE HISTORIC METHOD]

From the first years of the century we have been quickened andenriched by contributors from every quarter. The jurists brought usthat law of continuous growth which has transformed history from achronicle of casual occurrences into the likeness of somethingorganic. [76] Towards 1820 divines began to recast their doctrines onthe lines of development, of which Newman said, long after, thatevolution had come to confirm it. [77] Even the Economists, who werepractical men, dissolved their science into liquid history, affirmingthat it is not an auxiliary, but the actual subject-matter of theirinquiry. [78] Philosophers claim that, as early as 1804, they began tobow the metaphysical neck beneath the historical yoke. They taughtthat philosophy is only the amended sum of all philosophies, thatsystems pass with the age whose impress they bear, [79] that theproblem is to focus the rays of wandering but extant truth, and thathistory is the source of philosophy, if not quite a substitute forit. [80] Comte begins a volume with the words that the preponderance ofhistory over philosophy was the characteristic of the time he livedin. [81] Since Cuvier first recognised the conjunction between thecourse of inductive discovery and the course of civilization, [82]science had its share in saturating the age with historic ways ofthought, and subjecting all things to that influence for which thedepressing names historicism and historical-mindedness have beendevised. 

[Sidenote: DANGER OF OBLIVION]

[Sidenote: PROPHECY OF PITT]

There are certain faults which are corrigible mental defects on whichI ought to say a few denouncing words, because they are common to usall. First: the want of an energetic understanding of the sequence andreal significance of events, which would be fatal to a practicalpolitician, is ruin to a student of history who is the politician withhis face turned backwards. [83] It is playing at study, to see nothingbut the unmeaning and unsuggestive surface, as we generally do. Thenwe have a curious proclivity to neglect, and by degrees to forget, what has been certainly known. An instance or two will explain myidea. The most popular English writer relates how it happened in hispresence that the title of Tory was conferred upon the Conservativeparty. For it was an opprobrious name at the time, applied to men forwhom the Irish Government offered head-money; so that if I have madetoo sure of progress, I may at least complacently point to thisinstance of our mended manners. One day, Titus Oates lost his temperwith the men who refused to believe him, and after looking about for ascorching imprecation, he began to call them Tories. [84] The nameremained; but its origin, attested by Defoe, dropped out of commonmemory, as if one party were ashamed of their godfather, and the otherdid not care to be identified with his cause and character. You allknow, I am sure, the story of the news of Trafalgar, and how, twodays after it had arrived, Mr. Pitt, drawn by an enthusiastic crowd, went to dine in the city. When they drank the health of the ministerwho had saved his country, he declined the praise. “England, ” he said, “has saved herself by her own energy; and I hope that after havingsaved herself by her energy, she will save Europe by her example. ” In1814, when this hope had been realised, the last speech of the greatorator was remembered, and a medal was struck upon which the wholesentence was engraved, in four words of compressed Latin: “_Seipsamvirtute, Europam exemplo. _” Now it was just at the time of his lastappearance in public that Mr. Pitt heard of the overwhelming successof the French in Germany, and of the Austrian surrender at Ulm. Hisfriends concluded that the contest on land was hopeless, and that itwas time to abandon the Continent to the conqueror, and to fall backupon our new empire of the sea. Pitt did not agree with them. He saidthat Napoleon would meet with a check whenever he encountered anational resistance; and he declared that Spain was the place for it, and that then England would intervene. [85] General Wellesley, freshfrom India, was present. Ten years later, when he had accomplishedthat which Pitt had seen in the lucid prescience of his last days, herelated at Paris what I scarcely hesitate to call the most astoundingand profound prediction in all political history, where such thingshave not been rare. 

[Sidenote: RULES FOR THE STUDY OF HISTORY]

I shall never again enjoy the opportunity of speaking my thoughts tosuch an audience as this, and on so privileged an occasion a lecturermay well be tempted to bethink himself whether he knows of anyneglected truth, any cardinal proposition, that might serve as hisselected epigraph, as a last signal, perhaps even as a target. I amnot thinking of those shining precepts which are the registeredproperty of every school; that is to say—Learn as much by writing asby reading; be not content with the best book; seek sidelights fromthe others; have no favourites; keep men and things apart; guardagainst the prestige of great names;[86] see that your judgments areyour own, and do not shrink from disagreement; no trusting withouttesting; be more severe to ideas than to actions;[87] do not overlookthe strength of the bad cause or the weakness of the good;[88] neverbe surprised by the crumbling of an idol or the disclosure of askeleton; judge talent at its best and character at its worst; suspectpower more than vice, [89] and study problems in preference to periods;for instance: the derivation of Luther, the scientific influence ofBacon, the predecessors of Adam Smith, the mediæval masters ofRousseau, the consistency of Burke, the identity of the first Whig. Most of this, I suppose, is undisputed, and calls for no enlargement. But the weight of opinion is against me when I exhort you never todebase the moral currency or to lower the standard of rectitude, butto try others by the final maxim that governs your own lives, and tosuffer no man and no cause to escape the undying penalty which historyhas the power to inflict on wrong. [90] The plea in extenuation ofguilt and mitigation of punishment is perpetual. At every step we aremet by arguments which go to excuse, to palliate, to confound rightand wrong, and reduce the just man to the level of the reprobate. Themen who plot to baffle and resist us are, first of all, those who madehistory what it has become. They set up the principle that only afoolish Conservative judges the present time with the ideas of thePast; that only a foolish Liberal judges the Past with the ideas ofthe Present. [91]

[Sidenote: JUSTIFICATION OF THE PAST]

The mission of that school was to make distant times, and especiallythe middle ages, then most distant of all, intelligible and acceptableto a society issuing from the eighteenth century. There weredifficulties in the way; and among others this, that, in the firstfervour of the Crusades, the men who took the Cross, after receivingcommunion, heartily devoted the day to the extermination of Jews. Tojudge them by a fixed standard, to call them sacrilegious fanatics orfurious hypocrites, was to yield a gratuitous victory to Voltaire. Itbecame a rule of policy to praise the spirit when you could not defendthe deed. So that we have no common code; our moral notions are alwaysfluid; and you must consider the times, the class from which mensprang, the surrounding influences, the masters in their schools, thepreachers in their pulpits, the movement they obscurely obeyed, and soon, until responsibility is merged in numbers, and not a culprit isleft for execution. [92] A murderer was no criminal if he followedlocal custom, if neighbours approved, if he was encouraged byofficial advisers or prompted by just authority, if he acted for thereason of state or the pure love of religion, or if he shelteredhimself behind the complicity of the Law. The depression of moralitywas flagrant; but the motives were those which have enabled us tocontemplate with distressing complacency the secret of unhallowedlives. The code that is greatly modified by time and place, will varyaccording to the cause. The amnesty is an artifice that enables us tomake exceptions, to tamper with weights and measures, to deal unequaljustice to friends and enemies. 

[Sidenote: PHILOSOPHIES OF HISTORY]

It is associated with that philosophy which Cato attributes to thegods. For we have a theory which justifies Providence by the event, and holds nothing so deserving as success, to which there can be novictory in a bad cause, prescription and duration legitimate, [93] andwhatever exists is right and reasonable; and as God manifests His willby that which He tolerates, we must conform to the divine decree byliving to shape the Future after the ratified image of the Past. [94]Another theory, less confidently urged, regards History as our guide, as much by showing errors to evade as examples to pursue. It issuspicious of illusions in success, and, though there may be hope ofultimate triumph for what is true, if not by its own attraction, bythe gradual exhaustion of error, it admits no corresponding promisefor what is ethically right. It deems the canonisation of the historicPast more perilous than ignorance or denial, because it wouldperpetuate the reign of sin and acknowledge the sovereignty of wrong, and conceives it the part of real greatness to know how to stand andfall alone, stemming, for a lifetime, the contemporary flood. [95]

[Sidenote: DEBASING THE CURRENCY]

Ranke relates, without adornment, that William III. Ordered theextirpation of a Catholic clan, and scouts the faltering excuse of hisdefenders. But when he comes to the death and character of theinternational deliverer, Glencoe is forgotten, the imputation ofmurder drops, like a thing unworthy of notice. [96] Johannes Mueller, agreat Swiss celebrity, writes that the British Constitution occurredto somebody, perhaps to Halifax. This artless statement might not beapproved by rigid lawyers as a faithful and felicitous indication ofthe manner of that mysterious growth of ages, from occult beginnings, that was never profaned by the invading wit of man;[97] but it isless grotesque than it appears. Lord Halifax was the most originalwriter of political tracts in the pamphleteering crowd betweenHarrington and Bolingbroke; and in the Exclusion struggle he produceda scheme of limitations which, in substance, if not in form, foreshadowed the position of the monarchy in the later Hanoverianreigns. Although Halifax did not believe in the Plot, [98] he insistedthat innocent victims should be sacrificed to content the multitude. Sir William Temple writes:—“We only disagreed in one point, which wasthe leaving some priests to the law upon the accusation of beingpriests only, as the House of Commons had desired; which I thoughtwholly unjust. Upon this point Lord Halifax and I had so sharp adebate at Lord Sunderland's lodgings, that he told me, if I would notconcur in points which were so necessary for the people'ssatisfaction, he would tell everybody I was a Papist. And upon hisaffirming that the plot must be handled as if it were true, whether itwere so or no, in those points that were so generally believed. ” Inspite of this accusing passage Macaulay, who prefers Halifax to allthe statesmen of his age, praises him for his mercy: “His dislike ofextremes, and a forgiving and compassionate temper which seems to havebeen natural to him, preserved him from all participation in the worstcrimes of his time. ”

[Sidenote: SINFULNESS OF HISTORY]

[Sidenote: SOVEREIGNTY OF THE MORAL CODE]

If, in our uncertainty, we must often err, it may be sometimes betterto risk excess in rigour than in indulgence, for then at least we dono injury by loss of principle. As Bayle has said, it is more probablethat the secret motives of an indifferent action are bad thangood;[99] and this discouraging conclusion does not depend upontheology, for James Mozley supports the sceptic from the other flank, with all the artillery of Tractarian Oxford. “A Christian, ” he says, “is bound by his very creed to suspect evil, and cannot releasehimself. . . . He sees it where others do not; his instinct is divinelystrengthened; his eye is supernaturally keen; he has a spiritualinsight, and senses exercised to discern. . . . He owns the doctrine oforiginal sin; that doctrine puts him necessarily on his guard againstappearances, sustains his apprehension under perplexity, and prepareshim for recognising anywhere what he knows to be everywhere. ”[100]There is a popular saying of Madame de Staël, that we forgive whateverwe really understand. The paradox has been judiciously pruned by herdescendant, the Duke de Broglie, in the words: “Beware of too muchexplaining, lest we end by too much excusing. ”[101] History, saysFroude, does teach that right and wrong are real distinctions. Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the morallaw is written on the tablets of eternity. [102] And if there aremoments when we may resist the teaching of Froude, we have seldom thechance of resisting when he is supported by Mr. Goldwin Smith: “Asound historical morality will sanction strong measures in evil times;selfish ambition, treachery, murder, perjury, it will never sanctionin the worst of times, for these are the things that make timesevil. —Justice has been justice, mercy has been mercy, honour has beenhonour, good faith has been good faith, truthfulness has beentruthfulness from the beginning. ” The doctrine that, as Sir ThomasBrowne says, morality is not ambulatory, [103] is expressed as followsby Burke, who, when true to himself, is the most intelligent of ourinstructors: “My principles enable me to form my judgment upon men andactions in history, just as they do in common life; and are not formedout of events and characters, either present or past. History is apreceptor of prudence, not of principles. The principles of truepolitics are those of morality enlarged; and I neither now do, norever will admit of any other. ”[104]

[Sidenote: HISTORY AND CHARACTER]

Whatever a man's notions of these later centuries are, such, in themain, the man himself will be. Under the name of History, they coverthe articles of his philosophic, his religious, and his politicalcreed. [105] They give his measure; they denote his character: and, aspraise is the shipwreck of historians, his preferences betray him morethan his aversions. Modern history touches us so nearly, it is so deepa question of life and death, that we are bound to find our own waythrough it, and to owe our insight to ourselves. The historians offormer ages, unapproachable for us in knowledge and in talent, cannotbe our limit. We have the power to be more rigidly impersonal, disinterested and just than they; and to learn from undisguised andgenuine records to look with remorse upon the past, and to the futurewith assured hope of better things; bearing this in mind, that if welower our standard in history, we cannot uphold it in Church orState. 

 NOTES

[1] No political conclusions of any value for practice can bearrived at by direct experience. All true political science is, in onesense of the phrase, _a priori_, being deduced from the tendencies ofthings, tendencies known either through our general experience ofhuman nature, or as the result of an analysis of the course ofhistory, considered as a progressive evolution. —MILL, _InauguralAddress_, 51. 

[2] Contemporary history is, in Dr. Arnold's opinion, moreimportant than either ancient or modern; and in fact superior to it byall the superiority of the end to the means. —SEELEY, _Lectures andEssays_, 306. 

[3] The law of all progress is one and the same, theevolution of the simple into the complex by successivedifferentiations. —_Edinburgh Review_, clvii. 428. Die Entwickelungder Völker vollzieht sich nach zwei Gesetzen. Das erste Gesetz ist dasder Differenzierung. Die primitiven Einrichtungen sind einfach undeinheitlich, die der Civilisation zusammengesetzt und geteilt, und dieArbeitsteilung nimmt beständig zu. —SICKEL, _Goettingen GelehrteAnzeigen_, 1890, 563. 

[4] Nous risquons toujours d'être influencés par lespréjugés de notre époque; mais nous sommes libres des préjugésparticuliers aux époques antérieures. —E. NAVILLE, _Christianisme deFénelon_, 9. 

[5] La nature n'est qu'un écho de l'esprit. L'idée est lamère du fait, elle façonne graduellement le monde à sonimage. —FEUCHTERSLEBEN, _in_ CARO, _Nouvelles Études Morales_, 132. Iln'est pas d'étude morale qui vaille l'histoire d'une idée. —LABOULAYE, _Liberté Religieuse_, 25. 

[6] Il y a des savants qui raillent le sentiment religieux. Ils ne savent pas que c'est à ce sentiment, et par son moyen, que lascience historique doit d'avoir pu sortir de l'enfance. . . . Depuis dessiècles les âmes indépendantes discutaient les textes et lestraditions de l'église, quand les lettrés n'avaient pas encore eul'idée de porter un regard critique sur les textes de l'antiquitémondaine. —_La France Protestante_, ii. 17. 

[7] In our own history, above all, every step in advance hasbeen at the same time a step backwards. It has often been shown howour latest constitution is, amidst all external differences, essentially the same as our earliest, how every struggle for right andfreedom, from the thirteenth century onwards, has simply been astruggle for recovering something old. —FREEMAN, _Historical Essays_, iv. 253. Nothing but a thorough knowledge of the social system, basedupon a regular study of its growth, can give us the power we requireto affect it. —HARRISON, _Meaning of History_, 19. Eine Sache wird nurvöllig auf dem Wege verstanden, wie sie selbst entsteht. —In demgenetischen Verfahren sind die Gründe der Sache, auch die Gründe desErkennens. —TRENDELENBURG, _Logische Untersuchungen_, ii. 395, 388. 

[8] Une telle liberté . . . N'a rien de commun avec le savantsystème de garanties qui fait libres les peuples modernes. —BOUTMY, _Annales des Sciences Politiques_, i. 157. Les trois grandes réformesqui ont renouvelé l'Angleterre, la liberté religieuse, la réformeparlementaire, et la liberté économique, ont été obtenues sous lapression des organisations extra-constitutionnelles. —OSTROGORSKI, _Revue Historique_, lii. 272. 

[9] The question which is at the bottom of all constitutionalstruggles, the question between the national will and the nationallaw. —GARDINER, _Documents_, xviii. Religion, considered simply as theprinciple which balances the power of human opinion, which takes manout of the grasp of custom and fashion, and teaches him to referhimself to a higher tribunal, is an infinite aid to moral strength andelevation. —CHANNING, _Works_, iv. 83. Je tiens que le passé ne suffitjamais au présent. Personne n'est plus disposé que moi à profiter deses leçons; mais en même temps, je le demande, le présent nefournit-il pas toujours les indications qui lui sont propres?—MOLÉ, _in_ FALLOUX, _Études et Souvenirs_, 130. Admirons la sagesse de nospères, et tachons de l'imiter, en faisant ce qui convient à notresiècle. —GALIANI, _Dialogues_, 40. 

[10] Ceterum in legendis Historiis malim te ductum animi, quam anxias leges sequi. Nullae sunt, quae non magnas habeantutilitates; et melius haerent, quae libenter legimus. In universumtamen, non incipere ab antiquissimis, sed ab his, quae nostristemporibus nostraeque notitiae propius cohaerent, ac paulatim deindein remotiora eniti, magis è re arbitror. —GROTIUS, _Epistolæ_, 18. 

[11] The older idea of a law of degeneracy, of a “fatal drifttowards the worse, ” is as obsolete as astrology or the belief inwitchcraft. The human race has become hopeful, sanguine. —SEELEY, _Rede Lecture_, 1887. _Fortnightly Review_, July, 1887, 124. 

[12] Formuler des idées générales, c'est changer le salpêtreen poudre. —A. DE MUSSET, _Confessions d'un Enfant du Siècle_, 15. Lesrévolutions c'est l'avènement des idées libérales. C'est presquetoujours par les révolutions qu'elles prévalent et se fondent, etquand les idées libérales en sont véritablement le principe et le but, quand elles leur ont donné naissance, et quand elles les couronnent àleur dernier jour, alors ces révolutions sont légitimes. —RÉMUSAT, 1839, in _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1875, vi. 335. Il y a même despersonnes de piété qui prouvent par raison qu'il faut renoncer à laraison; que ce n'est point la lumière, mais la foi seule qui doit nousconduire, et que l'obéissance aveugle est la principale vertu deschrétiens. La paresse des inférieurs et leur esprit flatteurs'accommode souvent de cette vertu prétendue, et l'orgueil de ceux quicommandent en est toujours très content. De sorte qu'il se trouverapeut-être des gens qui seront scandalisés que je fasse cet honneur àla raison, de l'élever au-dessus de toutes les puissances, et quis'imagineront que je me révolte contre les autorités légitimes à causeque je prends son parti et que je soutiens que c'est à elle à décideret à regner. —MALEBRANCHE, _Morale_, i. 2, 13. That great statesman(Mr. Pitt) distinctly avowed that the application of philosophy topolitics was at that time an innovation, and that it was an innovationworthy to be adopted. He was ready to make the same avowal in thepresent day which Mr. Pitt had made in 1792. —CANNING, June 1, 1827. _Parliamentary Review_, 1828, 71. American history knows but oneavenue of success in American legislation, freedom from ancientprejudice. The best lawgivers in our colonies first became as littlechildren. —BANCROFT, _History of the United States_, i. 494. —EveryAmerican, from Jefferson and Gallatin down to the poorest squatter, seemed to nourish an idea that he was doing what he could to overthrowthe tyranny which the past had fastened on the human mind. —ADAMS, _History of the United States_, i. 175. 

[13] The greatest changes of which we have had experience asyet are due to our increasing knowledge of history and nature. Theyhave been produced by a few minds appearing in three or four favourednations, in comparatively a short period of time. May we be allowed toimagine the minds of men everywhere working together during many agesfor the completion of our knowledge? May not the increase of knowledgetransfigure the world?—JOWETT, _Plato_, i. 414. Nothing, I believe, is so likely to beget in us a spirit of enlightened liberality, ofChristian forbearance, of large-hearted moderation, as the careful studyof the history of doctrine and the history of interpretation. —PEROWNE, _Psalms_, i. P. Xxxi. 

[14] Ce n'est guère avant la seconde moitié du XVIIe sièclequ'il devint impossible de soutenir l'authenticité des faussesdécrétales, des Constitutions apostoliques, des RécognitionsClémentines, du faux Ignace, du pseudo-Dionys, et de l'immense fatrasd'œuvres anonymes ou pseudonymes qui grossissait souvent du tiersou de la moitié l'héritage littéraire des auteurs les plusconsidérables. —DUCHESNE, _Témoins anténicéens de la Trinité_, 1883, 36. 

[15] A man who does not know what has been thought by thosewho have gone before him is sure to set an undue value upon his ownideas. —M. PATTISON, _Memoirs_, 78. 

[16] Travailler à discerner, dans cette discipline, le solided'avec le frivole, le vrai d'avec le vraisemblable, la science d'avecl'opinion, ce qui forme le jugement d'avec ce qui ne fait que chargerla mémoire. —LAMY, _Connoissance de soi-même_, v. 459. 

[17] All our hopes of the future depend on a soundunderstanding of the past. —HARRISON, _The Meaning of History_, 6. 

[18] The real history of mankind is that of the slow advanceof resolved deed following laboriously just thought; and all thegreatest men live in their purpose and effort more than it is possiblefor them to live in reality. —The things that actually happened wereof small consequence—the thoughts that were developed are of infiniteconsequence. —RUSKIN. Facts are the mere dross of history. It is fromthe abstract truth which interpenetrates them, and lies latent amongthem like gold in the ore, that the mass derives its value. —MACAULAY, _Works_, v. 131. 

[19] Die Gesetze der Geschichte sind eben die Gesetze derganzen Menschheit, gehen nicht in die Geschicke eines Volkes, einerGeneration oder gar eines Einzelnen auf. Individuen und Geschlechter, Staaten und Nationen, können zerstäuben, die Menschheit bleibt. —A. SCHMIDT, _Züricher Monatschrift_. I. 45. 

[20] Le grand péril des âges démocratiques, soyez-en sûr, c'est la destruction ou l'affaiblissement excessif des parties ducorps social en présence du tout. Tout ce qui relève de nos joursl'idée de l'individu est sain. —TOCQUEVILLE, Jan. 3, 1840, _Œuvres_, vii. 97. En France, il n'y a plus d'hommes. On asystématiquement tué l'homme au profit du peuple, des masses, commedisent nos législateurs écervelés. Puis un beau jour, on s'est aperçuque ce peuple n'avait jamais existé qu'en projet, que ces massesétaient un troupeau mi-partie de moutons et de tigres. C'est unetriste histoire. Nous avons à relever l'âme humaine contre l'aveugleet brutale tyrannie des multitudes. —LANFREY, March 23, 1855. M. DUCAMP, _Souvenirs Littéraires_, ii. 273. C'est le propre de la vertud'être invisible, même dans l'histoire, à tout autre œil que celuide la conscience. —VACHEROT, _Comptes Rendus de l'Institut_, lxix. 319. Dans l'histoire où la bonté est la perle rare, qui a été bonpasse presque avant qui a été grand. —V. HUGO, _Les Misérables_, vii. 46. Grosser Maenner Leben und Tod der Wahrheit gemaess mit Liebe zuschildern, ist zu allen Zeiten herzerhebend; am meisten aber dann, wenn im Kreislauf der irdischen Dinge die Sterne wieder aehnlichstehen wie damals als sie unter uns lebten. —LASAULX, _Sokrates_, 3. Instead of saying that the history of mankind is the history of themasses, it would be much more true to say that the history of mankindis the history of its great men. —KINGSLEY, _Lectures_, 329. 

[21] Le génie n'est que la plus complète émancipation detoutes les influences de temps, de mœurs, et de pays. —NISARD, _Souvenirs_, ii. 43. 

[22] Meine kritische Richtung zieht mich in der Wissenschaftdurchaus zur Kritik meiner eigenen Gedanken hin, nicht zu der derGedanken Anderer. —ROTHE, _Ethik_, i. , p. Xi. 

[23] When you are in young years the whole mind is, as itwere, fluid, and is capable of forming itself into any shape that theowner of the mind pleases to order it to form itself into. —CARLYLE, _On the Choice of Books_, 131. Nach allem erscheint es somitunzweifelhaft als eine der psychologischen Voraussetzungen desStrafrechts, ohne welche der Zurechnungsbegriff nicht haltbar wäre, dass der Mensch für seinen Charakter verantwortlich ist und ihn mussabändern können. —RÜMELIN, _Reden und Aufsätze_, ii. , 60. An dertiefen und verborgenen Quelle, woraus der Wille entspringt, an diesemPunkt, nur hier steht die Freiheit, und führt das Steuer und lenkt denWillen. Wer nicht bis zu dieser Tiefe in sich einkehren und seinennatürlichen Charakter von hier aus bemeistern kann, der hat nicht denGebrauch seiner Freiheit, der ist nicht frei, sondern unterworfen demTriebwerk seiner Interessen, und dadurch in der Gewalt des Weltlaufs, worin jede Begebenheit und jede Handlung eine nothwendige Folge istaller vorhergehenden. —FISCHER, _Problem der Freiheit_, 27. 

[24] I must regard the main duty of a Professor to consist, not simply in communicating information, but in doing this in such amanner, and with such an accompaniment of subsidiary means, that theinformation he conveys may be the occasion of awakening his pupils toa vigorous and varied exertion of their faculties. —SIR W. HAMILTON, _Lectures_, i. 14. No great man really does his work by imposing hismaxims on his disciples, he evokes their life. The pupil may becomemuch wiser than his instructor, he may not accept his conclusions, buthe will own, “You awakened me to be myself, for that I thankyou. ”—MAURICE, _The Conscience_, 7, 8. 

[25] Ich sehe die Zeit kommen, wo wir die neuere Geschichtenicht mehr auf die Berichte selbst nicht der gleichzeitigenHistoriker, ausser in so weit ihnen neue originale Kenntnissbeiwohnte, geschweige denn auf die weiter abgeleiteten Bearbeitungenzu gründen haben, sondern aus den Relationen der Augenzeugen und derächten und unmittelbarsten Urkunden aufbauen werden. —RANKE, _Reformation_, _Preface_, 1838. Ce qu'on a trouvé et mis en œuvreest considérable en soi: c'est peu de chose au prix de ce qui reste àtrouver et à mettre en œuvre. —AULARD, _Études sur la Révolution_, 21. 

[26] N'attendez donc pas les leçons de l'expérience; ellescoûtent trop cher aux nations. —O. BARROT, _Mémoires_, ii. 435. Il y ades leçons dans tous les temps, pour tous les temps; et celles qu'onemprunte à des ennemis ne sont pas les moins précieuses. —LANFREY, _Napoléon_, v. P. Ii. Old facts may always be fresh, and may give outa fresh meaning for each generation. —MAURICE, _Lectures_, 62. Theobject is to lead the student to attend to them; to make him takeinterest in history not as a mere narrative, but as a chain of causesand effects still unwinding itself before our eyes, and full ofmomentous consequences to himself and his descendants—an unremittingconflict between good and evil powers, of which every act done by anyone of us, insignificant as we are, forms one of the incidents; aconflict in which even the smallest of us cannot escape from takingpart, in which whoever does not help the right side is helping thewrong. —MILL, _Inaugural Address_, 59. 

[27] I hold that the degree in which Poets dwell in sympathywith the Past, marks exactly the degree of their poeticalfaculty. —WORDSWORTH in C. FOX, _Memoirs_, June, 1842. In allpolitical, all social, all human questions whatever, history is themain resource of the inquirer. —HARRISON, _Meaning of History_, 15. There are no truths which more readily gain the assent of mankind, orare more firmly retained by them, than those of an historical nature, depending upon the testimony of others. —PRIESTLEY, _Letters to FrenchPhilosophers_, 9. Improvement consists in bringing our opinions intonearer agreement with facts; and we shall not be likely to do thiswhile we look at facts only through glasses coloured by those veryopinions. —MILL, _Inaugural Address_, 25. 

[28] He who has learnt to understand the true character andtendency of many succeeding ages is not likely to go very far wrong inestimating his own. —LECKY, _Value of History_, 21. C'est à l'histoirequ'il faut se prendre, c'est le fait que nous devons interroger, quandl'idée vacille et fuit à nos yeux. —MICHELET, _Disc. D'Ouverture_, 263. C'est la loi des faits telle qu'elle se manifeste dans leursuccession. C'est la règle de conduite donnée par la nature humaine etindiquée par l'histoire. C'est la logique, mais cette logique qui nefait qu'un avec l'enchaînement des choses. C'est l'enseignement del'expérience. —SCHERER, _Mélanges_, 558. Wer seine Vergangenheit nichtals seine Geschichte hat und weiss wird und ist characterlos Wem einEreigniss sein Sonst plötzlich abreisst von seinem Jetzt wird leichtwurzellos. —KLIEFOTH, _Rheinwalds Repertorium_, xliv. 20. La politiqueest une des meilleures écoles pour l'esprit. Elle force à chercher laraison de toutes choses, et ne permet pas cependant de la chercherhors des faits. —RÉMUSAT, _Le Temps Passé_, i. 31. It is an unsafepartition that divides opinions without principle from unprincipledopinions. —COLERIDGE, _Lay Sermon_, 373. 

 Wer nicht von drei tausend Jahren sich weiss Rechenschaft zu geben, Bleib' im Dunkeln unerfahren, mag von Tag zu Tage leben!

 GOETHE. 

What can be rationally required of the student of philosophy is not apreliminary and absolute, but a gradual and progressive, abrogation ofprejudices. —SIR W. HAMILTON, _Lectures_, iv. 92. 

[29] Die Schlacht bei Leuthen ist wohl die letzte, in welcherdiese religiösen Gegensätze entscheidend eingewirkt haben. —RANKE, _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, vii. 70. 

[30] The only real cry in the country is the proper and justold No Popery cry. —_Major Beresford_, July, 1847. Unfortunately thestrongest bond of union amongst them is an apprehension ofPopery. —_Stanley_, September 12, 1847. The great Protectionist partyhaving degenerated into a No Popery, No Jew Party, I am still moreunfit now than I was in 1846 to lead it. —_G. Bentinck_, December 26, 1847. _Croker's Memoirs_, iii. 116, 132, 157. 

[31] In the case of Protestantism, this constitutionalinstability is now a simple matter of fact, which has become too plainto be denied. The system is not fixed, but in motion; and the motionis for the time in the direction of complete self-dissolution. —Wetake it for a transitory scheme, whose breaking up is to make room indue time for another and far more perfect state of the Church. —Thenew order in which Protestantism is to become thus complete cannot bereached without the co-operation and help of Romanism. —NEVIN, _Mercersburg Review_, iv. 48. 

[32] Diese Heiligen waren es, die aus dem unmittelbarenGlaubensleben und den Grundgedanken der christlichen Freiheit zuerstdie Idee allgemeiner Menschenrechte abgeleitet und rein vonSelbstsucht vertheidigt haben. —WEINGARTEN, _Revolutionskirchen_, 447. Wie selbst die Idee allgemeiner Menschenrechte, die in dem gemeinsamenCharacter der Ebenbildlichkeit Gottes gegründet sind, erst durch dasChristenthum zum Bewusstsein gebracht werden, während jeder andereEifer für politische Freiheit als ein mehr oder wenigerselbstsüchtiger und beschränkter sich erwiesen hat. —NEANDER, _Pref. To Uhden's Wilberforce_, p. V. The rights of individuals and thejustice due to them are as dear and precious as those of states;indeed the latter are founded on the former, and the great end andobject of them must be to secure and support the rights ofindividuals, or else vain is government. —CUSHING in CONWAY, _Life ofPaine_, i. 217. As it is owned the whole scheme of Scripture is notyet understood; so, if it ever comes to be understood, before therestitution of all things, and without miraculous interpositions, itmust be in the same way as natural knowledge is come at—by thecontinuance and progress of learning and liberty. —BUTLER, _Analogy_, ii. 3. 

[33] Comme les lois elles-mêmes sont faillibles, et qu'ilpeut y avoir une autre justice que la justice écrite, les sociétésmodernes ont voulu garantir les droits de la conscience à la poursuited'une justice meilleure que celle qui existe; et là est le fondementde ce qu'on appelle liberté de conscience, liberté d'écrire, libertéde pensée. —JANET, _Philosophie Contemporaine_, 308. Si la forcematérielle a toujours fini par céder à l'opinion, combien plus nesera-t-elle pas contrainte de céder à la conscience? Car laconscience, c'est l'opinion renforcée par le sentiment del'obligation. —VINET, _Liberté Religieuse_, 3. 

[34] Après la volonté d'un homme, la raison d'état; après laraison d'état, la religion; après la religion, la liberté. Voilà toutela philosophie de l'histoire. —FLOTTES, _La Souveraineté du Peuple_, 1851, 192. La répartition plus égale des biens et des droits dans cemonde est le plus grand objet que doivent se proposer ceux qui mènentles affaires humaines. Je veux seulement que l'égalité en politiqueconsiste à être également libre. —TOCQUEVILLE, September 10, 1856. _Mme. Swetchine_, i. 455. On peut concevoir une législation trèssimple, lorsqu'on voudra en écarter tout ce qui est arbitraire, neconsulter que les deux premières lois de la liberté et de lapropriété, et ne point admettre de lois positives qui ne tirent leurraison de ces deux lois souveraines de la justice essentielle etabsolue. —LETROSNE, _Vues sur la Justice Criminelle_, 16. Summa enimlibertas est, ad optimum recta ratione cogi. —Nemo optat sibi hanclibertatem, volendi quae velit, sed potius volendi optima. —LEIBNIZ, _De Fato_. TRENDELENBURG, _Beiträge zur Philosophie_, ii. 190. 

[35] All the world is, by the very law of its creation, ineternal progress; and the cause of all the evils of the world may betraced to that natural, but most deadly error of human indolence andcorruption, that our business is to preserve and not toimprove. —ARNOLD, _Life_, i. 259. In whatever state of knowledge wemay conceive man to be placed, his progress towards a yet higher stateneed never fear a check, but must continue till the last existence ofsociety. —HERSCHEL, _Prel. Dis. _, 360. It is in the development ofthought as in every other development; the present suffers from thepast, and the future struggles hard in escaping from thepresent. —MAX MÜLLER, _Science of Thought_, 617. Most of the greatpositive evils of the world are in themselves removable, and will, ifhuman affairs continue to improve, be in the end reduced within narrowlimits. Poverty in any sense implying suffering may be completelyextinguished by the wisdom of society combined with the good sense andprovidence of individuals. —All the grand sources, in short, of humansuffering are in a great degree, many of them almost entirely, conquerable by human care and effort. —J. S. MILL, _Utilitarianism_, 21, 22. The ultimate standard of worth is personal worth, and the onlyprogress that is worth striving after, the only acquisition that istruly good and enduring, is the growth of the soul. —BIXBY, _Crisis ofMorals_, 210. La science, et l'industrie qu'elle produit, ont, parmitous les autres enfants du génie de l'homme, ce privilège particulier, que leur vol non-seulement ne peut pas s'interrompre, mais qu'ils'accélère sans cesse. —CUVIER, _Discours sur la Marche des Sciences_, 24 Avril, 1816. Aucune idée parmi celles qui se réfèrent à l'ordre desfaits naturels, ne tient de plus près à la famille des idéesreligieuses que l'idée du progrès, et n'est plus propre à devenir leprincipe d'une sorte de foi religieuse pour ceux qui n'en ont pasd'autres. Elle a, comme la foi religieuse, la vertu de relever lesâmes et les caractères. —COURNOT, _Marche des Idées_, ii. 425. Dans lespectacle de l'humanité errante, souffrante et travaillant toujours àmieux voir, à mieux penser, à mieux agir, à diminuer l'infirmité del'être humain, à apaiser l'inquiétude de son cœur, la sciencedécouvre une direction et un progrès. —A. SOREL, _Discours deRéception_, 14. Le jeune homme qui commence son éducation quinze ansaprès son père, à une époque où celui-ci, engagé dans une professionspéciale et active, ne peut que suivre les anciens principes, acquiertune supériorité théorique dont on doit tenir compte dans la hiérarchiesociale. Le plus souvent le père n'est-il pas pénétré de l'esprit deroutine, tandis que le fils représente et défend la scienceprogressive? En diminuant l'écart qui existait entre l'influence desjeunes générations et celle de la vieillesse ou de l'âge mûr, lespeuples modernes n'auraient donc fait que reproduire dans leur ordresocial un changement de rapports qui s'était déjà accompli dans lanature intime des choses. —BOUTMY, _Revue Nationale_, xxi. 393. Il y adans l'homme individuel des principes de progrès viager; il y a, entoute société, des causes constantes qui transforment ce progrèsviager en progrès héréditaire. Une société quelconque tend àprogresser tant que les circonstances ne touchent pas aux causes deprogrès que nous avons reconnues, l'imitation des dévanciers par lessuccesseurs, des étrangers par les indigènes. —LACOMBE, _L'Histoirecomme Science_, 292. Veram creatæ mentis beatitudinem consistere innon impedito progressu ad bona majora. —LEIBNIZ to WOLF, February 21, 1705. In cumulum etiam pulchritudinis perfectionisque universalisoperum divinorum progressus quidam perpetuus liberrimusque totiusuniversi est agnoscendus, ita ut ad majorem semper cultumprocedat. —LEIBNIZ ed. Erdmann, 150_a_. Der Creaturen und also auchunsere Vollkommenheit bestehet in einem ungehinderten starkenForttrieb zu neuen und neuen Vollkommenheiten. —LEIBNIZ, _DeutscheSchriften_, ii. 36. Hegel, welcher annahm, der Fortschritt der Neuzeitgegen das Mittelalter sei dieser, dass die Principien der Tugend unddes Christenthums, welche im Mittelalter sich allein im Privatlebenund der Kirche zur Geltung gebracht hätten, nun auch anfingen, daspolitische Leben zu durchdringen. —FORTLAGE, _Allg. Monatschrift_, 1853, 777. Wir Slawen wissen, dass die Geister einzelner Menschen undganzer Völker sich nur durch die Stufe ihrer Entwicklungunterscheiden. —MICKIEWICZ, _Slawische Literatur_, ii. 436. Le progrèsne disparait jamais, mais il se déplace souvent. Il va des gouvernantsaux gouvernés. La tendance des révolutions est de le ramener toujoursparmi les gouvernants. Lorsqu'il est à la tête des sociétés, il marchehardiment, car il conduit. Lorsqu'il est dans la masse, il marche àpas lents, car il lutte. —NAPOLEON III. , _Des Idées Napoléoniennes_. La loi du progrès avait jadis l'inexorable rigueur du destin; elleprend maintenant de jour en jour la douce puissance de la Providence. C'est l'erreur, c'est l'iniquité, c'est le vice, que la civilisationtend à emporter dans sa marche irrésistible; mais la vie des individuset des peuples est devenue pour elle une chose sacrée. Elle transformeplutôt qu'elle ne détruit les choses qui s'opposent à sondéveloppement; elle procède par absorption graduelle plutôt que parbrusque exécution; elle aime à conquérir par l'influence des idéesplutôt que par la force des armes, un peuple, une classe, uneinstitution qui résiste au progrès. —VACHEROT, _Essais de PhilosophieCritique_, 443. Peu à peu l'homme intellectuel finit par effacerl'homme physique. —QUETELET, _De l'Homme_, ii. 285. In dem Fortschrittder ethischen Anschauungen liegt daher der Kern des geschichtlichenFortschritts überhaupt. —SCHÄFER, _Arbeitsgebiet der Geschichte_, 24. Si l'homme a plus de devoirs à mesure qu'il avance en âge, ce qui estmélancolique, mais ce qui est vrai, de même aussi l'humanité est tenued'avoir une morale plus sévère à mesure qu'elle prend plus desiècles. —FAGUET, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1894, iii. 871. Si donc ily a une loi de progrès, elle se confond avec la loi morale, et lacondition fondamentale du progrès, c'est la pratique de cetteloi. —CARRAU, _Ib. _, 1875, v. 585. L'idée du progrès, dudéveloppement, me paraît être l'idée fondamentale contenue sous le motde civilisation. —GUIZOT, _Cours d'Histoire_, 1828, 15. Le progrèsn'est sous un autre nom, que la liberté en action. —BROGLIE, _Journaldes Débats_, January 28, 1869. Le progrès social est continu. Il a sespériodes de fièvre ou d'atonie, de surexcitation ou de léthargie; il ases soubresauts et ses haltes, mais il avance toujours. —DE DECKER, _La Providence_, 174. Ce n'est pas au bonheur seul, c'est auperfectionnement que notre destin nous appelle; et la libertépolitique est le plus puissant, le plus énergique moyen deperfectionnement que le ciel nous ait donné. —B. CONSTANT, _Cours dePolitique_, ii. 559. To explode error, on whichever side it lies, iscertainly to secure progress. —MARTINEAU, _Essays_, i. 114. Diesämmtlichen Freiheitsrechte, welche der heutigen Menschheit so theuer sind, sind im Grunde nur Anwendungen des Rechts der Entwickelung. —BLUNTSCHLI, _Kleine Schriften_, i. 51. Geistiges Leben ist auf Freiheit beruhendeEntwicklung, mit Freiheit vollzogene That und geschichtlicherFortschritt. —_Münchner Gel. Anzeigen_ 1849, ii. 83. Wie das Denkenerst nach und nach reift, so wird auch der freie Wille nicht fertiggeboren, sondern in der Entwickelung erworben. —TRENDELENBURG, _Logische Untersuchungen_, ii. 94. Das Liberum Arbitrium im vollenSinne (die vollständig aktuelle Macht der Selbstbestimmung) lässt sichseinem Begriff zufolge schlechterdings nicht unmittelbar geben; eskann nur erworben werden durch das Subjekt selbst, in sich moralischhervorgebracht werden kraft seiner eigenen Entwickelung. —ROTHE, _Ethik_, i. 360. So gewaltig sei der Andrang der Erfindungen undEntdeckungen, dass “Entwicklungsperioden, die in früheren Zeiten erstin Jahrhunderten durchlaufen wurden, die im Beginn unserer Zeitperiodenoch der Jahrzehnte bedurften, sich heute in Jahren volienden, häufigschon in voller Ausbildung ins Dasein treten. ”—PHILIPPOVICH, _Fortschritt und Kulturentwicklung_, 1892, i. Quoting SIEMENS, 1886. Wir erkennen dass dem Menschen die schwere körperliche Arbeit, von derer in seinem Kampfe um's Dasein stets schwer niedergedrückt war undgrossenteils noch ist, mehr und mehr durch die wachsende Benutzung derNaturkräfte zur mechanischen Arbeitsleistung abgenommen wird, dassdie ihm zufallende Arbeit immer mehr eine intellektuellewird. —SIEMENS, 1886, _Ib. _ 6. 

[36] Once, however, he wrote:—Darin könnte man den idealenKern der Geschichte des menschlichen Geschlechtes überhaupt sehen, dass in den Kämpfen, die sich in den gegenseitigen Interessen derStaaten und Völker vollziehen, doch immer höhere Potenzen emporkommen, die das Allgemeine demgemäss umgestalten und ihm wieder einen anderenCharakter verleihen. —RANKE, _Weltgeschichte_, iii. 1, 6. 

[37] Toujours et partout, les hommes furent de plus en plusdominés par l'ensemble de leurs prédécesseurs, dont ils purentseulement modifier l'empire nécessaire. —COMTE, _Politique Positive_, iii. 621. 

[38] La liberté est l'âme du commerce. —Il faut laisser faireles hommes qui s'appliquent sans peine à ce qui convient le mieux;c'est ce qui apporte le plus d'avantage. —COLBERT, in _Comptes Rendusde l'Institut_, xxxix. 93. 

[39] Il n'y a que les choses humaines exposées dans leurvérité, c'est-à-dire avec leur grandeur, leur variété, leurinépuisable fécondité, qui aient le droit de retenir le lecteur et quile retiennent en effet. Si l'écrivain paraît une fois, il ennuie oufait sourire de pitié les lecteurs sérieux. —THIERS to STE. BEUVE, _Lundis_, iii. 195. Comme l'a dit Taine, la disparition du style, c'est la perfection du style. —FAGUET, _Revue Politique_, lii. 67. 

[40] Ne m'applaudissez pas; ce n'est pas moi qui vous parle;c'est l'histoire qui parle par ma bouche. —_Revue Historique_, xli. 278. 

[41] Das Evangelium trat als Geschichte in die Welt, nichtals Dogma—wurde als Geschichte in der christlichen Kirchedeponirt. —ROTHE, _Kirchengeschichte_, ii. P. X. Das Christenthum istnicht der Herr Christus, sondern dieser macht es. Es ist sein Werk, und zwar ein Werk das er stets unter der Arbeit hat. —Er selbst, Christus der Herr, bleibt der er ist in alle Zukunft, dagegen liegt esausdrücklich im Begriffe seines Werks, des Christenthums, dass esnicht so bleibt wie es anhebt. —ROTHE, _Allgemeine kirchlicheZeitschrift_, 1864, 299. Diess Werk, weil es dem Wesen der Geschichtezufolge eine Entwickelung ist, muss über Stufen hinweggehen, dieeinander ablösen, und von denen jede folgende neue immer nur unter derZertrümmerung der ihr vorangehenden Platz greifen kann. —ROTHE, _Ib. _April 19, 1865. Je grösser ein geschichtliches Princip ist, destolangsamer und über mehr Stufen hinweg entfaltet es seinen Gehalt;desto langlebiger ist es aber ebendeshalb auch in diesen seinenunaufhörlichen Abwandelungen. —ROTHE, _Stille Stunden_, 301. Derchristliche Glaube geht nicht von der Anerkennung abstracterLehrwahrheiten aus, sondern von der Anerkennung einer Reihe vonThatsachen, die in der Erscheinung Jesu ihren Mittelpunkthaben. —NITZSCH, _Dogmengeschichte_, i. 17. Der Gedankengang derevangelischen Erzählung gibt darum auch eine vollständige Darstellungder christlichen Lehre in ihren wesentlichen Grundzügen; aber er gibtsie im allseitigen lebendigen Zusammenhange mit der Geschichte derchristlichen Offenbarung, und nicht in einer theoretischzusammenhängenden Folgenreihe von ethischen und dogmatischenLehrsätzen. —DEUTINGER, _Reich Gottes_, i. P. V. 

[42] L'Univers ne doit pas estre considéré seulement dans cequ'il est; pour le bien connoître, il faut le voir aussi dans ce qu'ildoit estre. C'est cet avenir surtout qui a été le grand objet de Dieudans la création, et c'est pour cet avenir seul que le présentexiste. —D'HOUTEVILLE, _Essai sur la Providence_, 273. La Providenceemploie les siècles à élever toujours un plus grand nombre de familleset d'individus à ces biens de la liberté et de l'égalité légitimesque, dans l'enfance des sociétés, la force avait rendus le privilègede quelques-uns. —GUIZOT, _Gouvernement de la France_, 1820, 9. Lamarche de la Providence n'est pas assujettie à d'étroites limites;elle ne s'inquiète pas de tirer aujourd'hui la conséquence du principequ'elle a posé hier; elle la tirera dans des siècles, quand l'heuresera venue; et pour raisonner lentement selon nous, sa logique n'estpas moins sûre. —GUIZOT, _Histoire de la Civilisation_, 20. Der Keimfortschreitender Entwicklung ist, auch auf göttlichem Geheisse, derMenschheit eingepflanzt. Die Weltgeschichte ist der blosse Ausdruckeiner vorbestimmten Entwicklung. —A. HUMBOLDT, January 2, 1842, _ImNeuen Reich_, 1872, i. 197. Das historisch grosse ist religiös gross;es ist die Gottheit selbst, die sich offenbart. —RAUMER, April 1807, _Erinnerungen_, i. 85. 

[43] Je suis arrivé à l'âge où je suis, à travers bien desévènements différents, mais avec une seule cause, celle de la libertérégulière. —TOCQUEVILLE, May 1, 1852, _Œuvres Inédites_, ii. 185. Me trouvant dans un pays où la religion et le libéralisme sontd'accord, j'avais respiré. —J'exprimais ce sentiment, il y a plus devingt ans, dans l'avant-propos de la _Démocratie_. Je l'éprouveaujourd'hui aussi vivement que si j'étais encore jeune, et je ne saiss'il y a une seule pensée qui ait été plus constamment présente à monesprit. —August 5, 1857, _Œuvres_, vi. 395. Il n'y a que la liberté(j'entends la modérée et la régulière) et la religion, qui, par uneffort combiné, puissent soulever les hommes au-dessus du bourbier oùl'égalité démocratique les plonge naturellement. —December 1, 1852, _Œuvres_, vii. 295. L'un de mes rêves, le principal en entrant dansla vie politique, était de travailler à concilier l'esprit libéral etl'esprit de religion, la société nouvelle et l'église. —November 15, 1843, _Œuvres Inédites_, ii. 121. La véritable grandeur de l'hommen'est que dans l'accord du sentiment libéral et du sentimentreligieux. —September 17, 1853, _Œuvres Inédites_, ii. 228. Quicherche dans la liberté autre chose qu'elle-même est fait pourservir. —_Ancien Régime_, 248. Je regarde, ainsi que je l'ai toujoursfait, la liberté comme le premier des biens; je vois toujours en ellel'une des sources les plus fécondes des vertus mâles et des actionsgrandes. Il n'y a pas de tranquillité ni de bien-être qui puisse metenir lieu d'elle. —January 7, 1856, _Mme. Swetchine_, i. 452. Laliberté a un faux air d'aristocratie; en donnant pleine carrière auxfacultés humaines, en encourageant le travail et l'économie, elle faitressortir les supériorités naturelles ou acquises. —LABOULAYE, _L'Étatet ses Limites_, 154. Dire que la liberté n'est point par elle-même, qu'elle dépend d'une situation, d'une opportunité, c'est lui assignerune valeur négative. La liberté n'est pas dès qu'on la subordonne. Elle n'est pas un principe purement négatif, un simple élément decontrôle et de critique. Elle est le principe actif, créateurorganisateur par excellence. Elle est le moteur et la règle, la sourcede toute vie, et le principe de l'ordre. Elle est, en un mot, le nomque prend la conscience souveraine, lorsque, se posant en face dumonde social et politique, elle émerge du moi pour modeler lessociétés sur les données de la raison. —BRISSON, _Revue Nationale_, xxiii. 214. Le droit, dans l'histoire, est le développement progressifde la liberté, sous la loi de la raison. —LERMINIER, _Philosophie duDroit_, i. 211. En prouvant par les leçons de l'histoire que laliberté fait vivre les peuples et que le despotisme les tue, enmontrant que l'expiation suit la faute et que la fortune finitd'ordinaire par se ranger du côté de la vertu, Montesquieu n'est nimoins moral ni moins religieux que Bossuet. —LABOULAYE, _Œuvres deMontesquieu_, ii. 109. Je ne comprendrais pas qu'une nation ne plaçâtpas les libertés politiques au premier rang, parce que c'est deslibertés politiques que doivent découler toutes les autres. —THIERS, _Discours_, x. 8, _March_ 28, 1865. Nous sommes arrivés à une époqueoù la liberté est le but sérieux de tous, où le reste n'est plusqu'une question de moyens. —J. LEBEAU, _Observations sur le PouvoirRoyal_: Liége, 1830, p. 10. Le libéralisme, ayant la prétention de sefonder uniquement sur les principes de la raison, croit d'ordinairen'avoir pas besoin de tradition. Là est son erreur. L'erreur del'école libérale est d'avoir trop cru qu'il est facile de créer laliberté par la réflexion, et de n'avoir pas vu qu'un établissementn'est solide que quand il a des racines historiques. —RENAN, 1858, _Nouvelle Revue_, lxxix. 596. Le respect des individus et des droitsexistants est autant au-dessus du bonheur de tous, qu'un intérêt moralsurpasse un intérêt purement temporel. —RENAN, 1858, _Ib. _ lxxix. 597. Die Rechte gelten nichts, wo es sich handelt um das Recht, und dasRecht der Freiheit kann nie verjähren, weil es die Quelle allesRechtes selbst ist. —C. FRANTZ, _Ueber die Freiheit_, 110. Wirerfahren hienieden nie die ganze Wahrheit: wir geniessen nie die ganzeFreiheit. —REUSS, _Reden_, 56. Le gouvernement constitutionnel, commetout gouvernement libre, présente et doit présenter un état de luttepermanent. La liberté est la perpétuité de la lutte. —DE SERRE. BROGLIE, _Nouvelles Études_, 243. The experiment of free government isnot one which can be tried once for all. Every generation must try itfor itself. As each new generation starts up to the responsibilitiesof manhood, there is, as it were, a new launch of Liberty, and itsvoyage of experiment begins afresh. —WINTHROP, _Addresses_, 163. L'histoire perd son véritable caractère du moment que la liberté en adisparu; elle devient une sorte de physique sociale. C'est l'élémentpersonnel de l'histoire qui en fait la réalité. —VACHEROT, _Revue desDeux Mondes_, 1869, iv. 215. Demander la liberté pour soi et larefuser aux autres, c'est la définition du despotisme. —LABOULAYE, December 4, 1874. Les causes justes profitent de tout, des bonnesintentions comme des mauvaises, des calculs personnels comme desdévouemens courageux, de la démence, enfin, comme de la raison. —B. CONSTANT, _Les Cent Jours_, ii. 29. Sie ist die Kunst, das Gute derschon weit gediehenen Civilisation zu sichern. —BALTISCH, _PolitischeFreiheit_, 9. In einem Volke, welches sich zur bürgerlichenGesellschaft, überhaupt zum Bewusstseyn der Unendlichkeit desFreien—entwickelt hat, ist nur die constitutionelle Monarchiemöglich. —HEGEL'S _Philosophie des Rechts_, § 137, _Hegel undPreussen_, 1841, 31. Freiheit ist das höchste Gut. Alles andere istnur das Mittel dazu: gut falls es ein Mittel dazu ist, übel falls esdieselbe hemmt. —FICHTE, _Werke_, iv. 403. You are not to inquire howyour trade may be increased, nor how you are to become a great andpowerful people, but how your liberties can be secured. For libertyought to be the direct end of your government. —PATRICK HENRY, 1788. WIRT, _Life of Henry_, 272. 

[44] Historiæ ipsius præter delectationem utilitas nulla est, quam ut religionis Christianæ veritas demonstretur, quod aliter quamper historiam fieri non potest. —LEIBNIZ, _Opera_, ed. Dutens, vi. 297. The study of Modern History is, next to Theology itself, and onlynext in so far as Theology rests on a divine revelation, the mostthoroughly religious training that the mind can receive. It is noparadox to say that Modern History, including Medieval History in theterm, is co-extensive in its field of view, in its habits ofcriticism, in the persons of its most famous students, withEcclesiastical History. —STUBBS, _Lectures_, 9. Je regarde doncl'étude de l'histoire comme l'étude de la providence. —L'histoire estvraiment une seconde philosophie. —Si Dieu ne parle pas toujours, ilagit toujours en Dieu. —D'AGUESSEAU, _Œuvres_, xv. 34, 31, 35. Fürdiejenigen, welche das Wesen der menschlichen Freiheit erkannt haben, bildet die denkende Betrachtung der Weltgeschichte, besonders deschristlichen Weltalters, die höchste, und umfassendste Theodicee. —VATKE, _Die Menschliche Freiheit_, 1841, 516. La théologie, que l'on regardevolontiers comme la plus étroite et la plus stérile des sciences, enest, au contraire, la plus étendue et la plus féconde. Elle confine àtoutes les études et touche à toutes les questions. Elle renferme tousles éléments d'une instruction libérale. —SCHERER, _Mélanges_, 522. Thebelief that the course of events and the agency of man are subject tothe laws of a divine order, which it is alike impossible for any oneeither fully to comprehend or effectually to resist—this belief is theground of all our hope for the future destinies of mankind. —THIRLWALL, _Remains_, iii. 282. A true religion must consist of ideas and factsboth; not of ideas alone without facts, for then it would be merephilosophy; nor of facts alone without ideas, of which those facts arethe symbols, or out of which they are grounded; for then it would bemere history. —COLERIDGE, _Table Talk_, 144. It certainly appearsstrange that the men most conversant with the order of the visibleuniverse should soonest suspect it empty of directing mind; and, onthe other hand, that humanistic, moral and historical studies—whichfirst open the terrible problems of suffering and grief, and containall the reputed provocatives of denial and despair—should confirm, andenlarge rather than disturb, the prepossessions of naturalpiety. —MARTINEAU, _Essays_, i. 122. Die Religion hat nur dann eineBedeutung für den Menschen, wenn er in der Geschichte einen Punktfindet, dem er sich völlig unbedingt hingeben kann. —STEFFENS, _Christliche Religionsphilosophie_, 440, 1839. Wir erkennen darin nureine Thätigkeit des zu seinem ächten und wahren Leben, zu seinemverlornen, objectiven Selbstverständnisse sich zurücksehnendenchristlichen Geistes unserer Zeit, einen Ausdruck für das Bedürfnissdesselben, sich aus den unwahren und unächten Verkleidungen, womit ihnder moderne, subjective Geschmack der letzten Entwicklungsphase destheologischen Bewusstseyns umhüllt hat, zu seiner historischen alleinwahren und ursprünglichen Gestalt wiederzugebären, zu derjenigenBedeutung zurückzukehren, die ihm in dem Bewusstseyn der Geschichteallein zukommt und deren Verständniss in dem wogenden luxuriösen Lebender modernen Theologie längst untergegangen ist. —GEORGII, _Zeitschriftfür Hist. Theologie_, ix. 5, 1839. 

[45] Liberty, in fact, means just so far as it is realised, the right man in the right place. —SEELEY, _Lectures and Essays_, 109. 

[46] In diesem Sinne ist Freiheit und sich entwickelndemoralische Vernunft und Gewissen gleichbedeutend. In diesem Sinne istder Mensch frei, sobald sich das Gewissen in ihm entwickelt. —SCHEIDLER, _Ersch und Gruber_, xlix. 20. Aus der unendlichen und ewigen Geltungder menschlichen Persönlichkeit vor Gott, aus der Vorstellung von derin Gott freien Persönlichkeit, folgt auch der Anspruch auf das Rechtderselben in der weltlichen Sphäre, auf bürgerliche und politischeFreiheit, auf Gewissen und Religionsfreiheit, auf freiewissenschaftliche Forschung u. S. W. , und namentlich die Forderung dassniemand lediglich zum Mittel für andere diene. —MARTENSEN, _ChristlicheEthik_, i. 50. 

[47] Es giebt angeborne Menschenrechte, weil es angeborneMenschenpflichten giebt. —WOLFF, _Naturrecht_; LŒPER, _Einleitungzu Faust_, lvii. 

[48] La constitution de l'état reste jusqu'à un certain pointà notre discrétion. La constitution de la société ne dépend pas denous; elle est donnée par la force des choses, et si l'on veut éleverle langage, elle est l'œuvre de la Providence. —RÉMUSAT, _Revue desDeux Mondes_, 1861, v. 795. 

[49] Die Freiheit ist bekanntlich kein Geschenk der Götter, sondern ein Gut das jedes Volk sich selbst verdankt und das nur beidem erforderlichen Mass moralischer Kraft und Würdigkeitgedeiht. —IHERING, _Geist des Römischen Rechts_, ii. 290. Liberty, inthe very nature of it, absolutely requires and even supposes, thatpeople be able to govern themselves in those respects in which theyare free; otherwise their wickedness will be in proportion to theirliberty, and this greatest of blessings will become a curse. —BUTLER, _Sermons_, 331. In each degree and each variety of public developmentthere are corresponding institutions, best answering the public needs;and what is meat to one is poison to another. Freedom is for those whoare fit for it. —PARKMAN, _Canada_, 396. Die Freiheit ist die Wurzeleiner neuen Schöpfung in der Schöpfung. —SEDERHOLM, _Die ewigenThatsachen_, 86. 

[50] La liberté politique, qui n'est qu'une complexité plusgrande, de plus en plus grande, dans le gouvernement d'un peuple, àmesure que le peuple lui-même contient un plus grand nombre de forcesdiverses ayant droit et de vivre et de participer à la chose publique, est un fait de civilisation qui s'impose lentement à une sociétéorganisée, mais qui n'apparaît point comme un principe à une sociétéqui s'organise. —FAGUET, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1889, ii. 942. 

[51] Il y a bien un droit du plus sage, mais non pas un droitdu plus fort. —La justice est le droit du plus faible. —JOUBERT, _Pensées_, i. 355, 358. 

[52] Nicht durch ein pflanzenähnliches Wachsthum, nicht ausden dunklen Gründen der Volksempfindung, sondern durch den männlichenWillen, durch die Ueberzeugung, durch die That, durch den Kampfentsteht, behauptet, entwickelt sich das Recht. Sein historischesWerden ist ein bewusstes, im hellen Mittagslicht der Erkenntniss undder Gesetzgebung. —_Rundschau_, Nov. 1893, 313. Nicht das Normale, Zahme, sondern das Abnorme, Wilde, bildet überall die Grundlage undden Anfang einer neuen Ordnung. —LASAULX, _Philosophie derGeschichte_, 143. 

[53] Um den Sieg zu vervollständigen, erübrigte das zweiteStadium oder die Aufgabe: die Berechtigung der Mehrheit nach allenSeiten hin zur gleichen Berechtigung aller zu erweitern, d. H. Bis zurGleichstellung aller Bekenntnisse im Kirchenrecht, aller Völker imVölkerrecht, aller Staatsbürger im Staatsrecht und aller socialenInteressen im Gesellschaftsrecht fortzuführen. —A. SCHMIDT, _ZüricherMonatschrift_, i. 68. 

[54] Notre histoire ne nous enseignait nullement la liberté. Le jour où la France voulut être libre, elle eut tout à créer, tout àinventer dans cet ordre de faits. —Cependant il faut marcher, l'avenirappelle les peuples. Quand on n'a point pour cela l'impulsion dupassé, il faut bien se confier à la raison. —DUPONT WHITE, _Revue desDeux Mondes_, 1861, vi. 191. Le peuple français a peu de goût pour ledéveloppement graduel des institutions. Il ignore son histoire, il nes'y reconnaît pas, elle n'a pas laissé de trace dans saconscience. —SCHERER, _Études Critiques_, i. 100. Durch die Revolutionbefreiten sich die Franzosen von ihrer Geschichte. —ROSENKRANZ, _Auseinem Tagebuch_, 199. 

[55] The discovery of the comparative method in philology, inmythology—let me add in politics and history and the whole range ofhuman thought—marks a stage in the progress of the human mind atleast as great and memorable as the revival of Greek and Latinlearning. —FREEMAN, _Historical Essays_, iv. 301. The diffusion of acritical spirit in history and literature is affecting the criticismof the Bible in our own day in a manner not unlike the burst ofintellectual life in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. —JOWETT, _Essays and Reviews_, 346. As the revival of literature in thesixteenth century produced the Reformation, so the growth of thecritical spirit, and the change that has come over mental science, andthe mere increase of knowledge of all kinds, threaten now a revolutionless external but not less profound. —HADDAN, _Replies_, 348. 

[56] In his just contempt and detestation of the crimes andfollies of the Revolutionists, he suffers himself to forget that therevolution itself is a process of the Divine Providence, and that asthe folly of men is the wisdom of God, so are their iniquitiesinstruments of His goodness. —COLERIDGE, _Biographia Literaria_, ii. 240. In other parts of the world, the idea of revolutions ingovernment is, by a mournful and indissoluble association, connectedwith the idea of wars, and all the calamities attendant on wars. Buthappy experience teaches us to view such revolutions in a verydifferent light—to consider them only as progressive steps inimproving the knowledge of government, and increasing the happiness ofsociety and mankind. —J. WILSON, November 26, 1787, _Works_, iii. 293. La Révolution, c'est-à-dire l'œuvre des siècles, ou, si vousvoulez, le renouvellement progressif de la société, ou encore, sanouvelle constitution. —RÉMUSAT, _Correspondance_, October 11, 1818. Ases yeux loin d'avoir rompu le cours naturel des évènements, ni laRévolution d'Angleterre, ni la nôtre, n'ont rien dit, rien fait, quin'eût été dit, souhaité, fait, ou tenté cent fois avant leurexplosion. “Il faut en ceci, ” dit-il, “tout accorder à leursadversaires, les surpasser même en sévérité, ne regarder à leursaccusations que pour y ajouter, s'ils en oublient; et puis les sommerde dresser, à leur tour, le compte des erreurs, des crimes, et desmaux de ces temps et de ces pouvoirs qu'ils ont pris sous leurgarde. ”—_Revue de Paris_, xvi. 303, on Guizot. Quant aux nouveautésmises en œuvre par la Révolution Française on les retrouve une àune, en remontant d'âge en âge, chez les philosophes du XVIIIesiècle, chez les grands penseurs du XVIe, chez certains Pèresd'Église et jusque dans la République de Platon. —En présence de cettebelle continuité de l'histoire, qui ne fait pas plus de sauts que lanature, devant cette solidarité nécessaire des révolutions avec lepassé qu'elles brisent. —KRANTZ, _Revue Politique_, xxxiii. 264. L'esprit du XIXe siècle est de comprendre et de juger les choses dupassé. Notre œuvre est d'expliquer ce que le XVIIIe siècle avaitmission de nier. —VACHEROT, _De la Démocratie_, pref. , 28. 

[57] La commission recherchera, dans toutes les parties desarchives pontificales, les pièces relatives à l'abus que les papes ontfait de leur ministère spirituel contre l'autorité des souverains etla tranquillité des peuples. —DAUNOU, _Instructions_, Jan. 3, 1811. LABORDE, _Inventaires_, p. Cxii. 

[58] Aucun des historiens remarquables de cette époquen'avait senti encore le besoin de chercher les faits hors des livresimprimés, aux sources primitives, la plupart inédites alors, auxmanuscrits de nos bibliothèques, aux documents de nos archives. —MICHELET, _Histoire de France_, 1869, i. 2. 

[59] Doch besteht eine Grenze, wo die Geschichte aufhört unddas Archiv anfängt, und die von der Geschichtschreibung nichtüberschritten werden sollte. _Unsere Zeit_, 1866, ii. 635. Il fautavertir nos jeunes historiens à la fois de la nécessité inéluctable dudocument et, d'autre part, du danger qu'il présente. —M. HANOTAUX. 

[60] This process consists in determining with documentaryproofs, and by minute investigations duly set forth, the literal, precise, and positive inferences to be drawn at the present day fromevery authentic statement, without regard to commonly receivednotions, to sweeping generalities, or to possible consequences. —HARRISSE, _Discovery of America_, 1892, p. Vi. Perhaps the time has not yet comefor synthetic labours in the sphere of History. It may be that thestudent of the Past must still content himself with criticalinquiries. —_Ib. _ p. V. Few scholars are critics, few critics arephilosophers, and few philosophers look with equal care on both sidesof a question. —W. S. LANDOR in HOLYOAKE'S _Agitator's Life_, ii. 15. Introduire dans l'histoire, et sans tenir compte des passionspolitiques et religieuses, le doute méthodique que Descartes, lepremier, appliqua à l'étude de la philosophie, n'est-ce pas là uneexcellente méthode? n'est-ce pas même la meilleure?—CHANTELAUZE, _Correspondant_, 1883, i. 129. La critique historique ne sera jamaispopulaire. Comme elle est de toutes les sciences la plus délicate, laplus déliée, elle n'a de crédit qu'auprès des esprits cultivés. —CHERBULIEZ, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, xcvii. 517. Nun liefert aber die Kritik, wennsie rechter Art ist, immer nur einzelne Data, gleichsam die Atome desThatbestandes, und jede Kombination, jede Zusammenfassung undSchlussfolgerung, ohne die es doch einmal nicht abgeht, ist einsubjektiver Akt des Forschers. Demnach blieb Waitz, bei der eigenenArbeit wie bei jener der anderen, immer höchst mistrauisch gegen jedesRésumé, jede Definition, jedes abschliessende Wort. —SYBEL, _Historische Zeitschrift_, lvi. 484. Mit blosser Kritik wird darinnichts ausgerichtet, denn die ist nur eine Vorarbeit, welche daaufhört wo die echte historische Kunst anfängt. —LASAULX, _Philosophieder Künste_, 212. 

[61] The only case in which such extraneous matters can befairly called in is when facts are stated resting on testimony; thenit is not only just, but it is necessary for the sake of truth, toinquire into the habits of mind of him by whom they areadduced. —BABBAGE, _Bridgewater Treatise_, p. Xiv. 

[62] There is no part of our knowledge which it is moreuseful to obtain at first hand—to go to the fountain-head for—thanour knowledge of History. —J. S. MILL, _Inaugural Address_, 34. Theonly sound intellects are those which, in the first instance, settheir standard of proof high. —J. S. MILL, _Examination of Hamilton'sPhilosophy_, 525. 

[63] There are so few men mentally capable of seeing bothsides of a question; so few with consciences sensitively alive to theobligation of seeing both sides; so few placed under conditions eitherof circumstance or temper, which admit of their seeing bothsides. —GREG, _Political Problems_, 1870, 173. Il n'y a que lesAllemands qui sachent être aussi complètement objectifs. Ils sedédoublent, pour ainsi dire, en deux hommes, l'un qui a des principestrès arrêtés et des passions très vives, l'autre qui sait voir etobserver comme s'il n'en avait point. —LAVELEYE, _Revue des DeuxMondes_, 1868, i. 431. L'écrivain qui penche trop dans le sens où ilincline, et qui ne se défie pas de ses qualités presque autant que sesdéfauts, cet écrivain tourne à la manière. —SCHERER, _Mélanges_, 484. Il faut faire volte-face, et vivement, franchement, tourner le dos aumoyen âge, à ce passé morbide, qui, même quand il n'agit pas, influeterriblement par la contagion de la mort. Il ne faut ni combattre, nicritiquer, mais oublier. Oublions et marchons!—MICHELET, _La Bible del'Humanité_, 483. It has excited surprise that Thucydides should speakof Antiphon, the traitor to the democracy, and the employer ofassassins, as “a man inferior in virtue to none of hiscontemporaries. ” But neither here nor elsewhere does Thucydides passmoral judgments. —JOWETT, _Thucydides_, ii. 501. 

[64] Non theologi provinciam suscepimus; scimus enim quantumhoc ingenii nostri tenuitatem superet: ideo sufficit nobis τὀ ὅτιfideliter ex antiquis auctoribus retulisse. —MORINUS, _DePœnitentia_, ix. 10. —Il faut avouer que la religion chrétienne aquelque chose d'étonnant! C'est parce que vous y êtes né, dira-t-on. Tant s'en faut, je me roidis contre par cette raison-là même, de peurque cette prévention ne me suborne. —PASCAL, _Pensées_, XVI. , 7. —Iwas fond of Fleury for a reason which I express in the advertisement;because it presented a sort of photograph of ecclesiastical historywithout any comment upon it. In the event, that simple representationof the early centuries had a good deal to do with unsettlingme. —NEWMAN, _Apologia_, 152. —Nur was sich vor dem Richterstuhl einerächten, unbefangenen, nicht durch die Brille einer philosophischenoder dogmatischen Schule stehenden Wissenschaft als wahr bewährt, kannzur Erbauung, Belehrung und Warnung tüchtig seyn. —NEANDER, _Kirchengeschichte_, i. P. Vii. Wie weit bei katholischen Publicistenbei der Annahme der Ansicht von der Staatsanstalt apologetischeGesichtspunkte massgebend gewesen sind, mag dahingestellt bleiben. DerHistoriker darf sich jedoch nie durch apologetische Zwecke leitenlassen; sein einziges Ziel soll die Ergründungder Wahrheitsein. —PASTOR, _Geschichte der Päbste_, ii. 545. Church historyfalsely written is a school of vainglory, hatred, and uncharitableness;truly written, it is a discipline of humility, of charity, of mutuallove. —SIR W. HAMILTON, _Discussions_, 506. The more trophies andcrowns of honour the Church of former ages can be shown to have won inthe service of her adorable head, the more tokens her history can bebrought to furnish of his powerful presence in her midst, the morewill we be pleased and rejoice, Protestant though we be. —NEVIN, _Mercersburg Review_, 1851, 168. S'il est une chose à laquelle j'aidonné tous mes soins, c'est à ne pas laisser influencer mes jugementspar les opinions politiques ou religieuses; que si j'ai quelquefoispéché par quelque excès, c'est par la bienveillance pour les œuvres deceux qui pensent autrement que moi. —MONOD, _R. Hist. _, xvi. 184. Nousn'avons nul intérêt à faire parler l'histoire en faveur de nospropres opinions. C'est son droit imprescriptible que le narrateurreproduise tous les faits sans aucune réticence et range toutes lesévolutions dans leur ordre naturel. Notre récit restera complètementen dehors des préoccupations de la dogmatique et des déclamations dela polémique. Plus les questions auxquelles nous aurons à toucheragitent et passionnent de nos jours les esprits, plus il est du devoirde l'historien de s'effacer devant les faits qu'il veut faireconnaître. —REUSS, _Nouvelle Revue de Théologie_, vi. 193, 1860. Tolove truth for truth's sake is the principal part of human perfectionin this world, and the seed plot of all other virtues. —LOCKE, _Letterto Collins_. Il n'est plus possible aujourd'hui à l'historien d'êtrenational dans le sens étroit du mot. Son patriotisme à lui c'estl'amour de la vérité. Il n'est pas l'homme d'une race ou d'un pays, ilest l'homme de tous les pays, il parle au nom de la civilisationgénérale. —LANFREY, _Hist. De Nap. _, iii. 2, 1870. Juger avec lesparties de soi-même qui sont le moins des formes du tempérament, et leplus des facultés pénétrées et modelées par l'expérience, par l'étude, par l'investigation, par le non-moi. —FAGUET, _R. De Paris_, i. 151. Aucun critique n'est aussi impersonnel que lui, aussi libre de partipris et d'opinions préconçues, aussi objectif. —Il ne mêle ou paraitmêler à ses appréciations ni inclinations personnelles de goût oud'humeur, ou théories d'aucune sorte. —G. MONOD, of Faguet, _RevueHistorique_, xlii. 417. On dirait qu'il a peur, en généralisant sesobservations, en systématisant ses connaissances, de mêler de lui-mêmeaux choses. —Je lis tout un volume de M. Faguet, sans penser une foisà M. Faguet: je ne vois que les originaux qu'il montre. —J'envisagetoujours une réalité objective, jamais l'idée de M. Faguet, jamais ladoctrine de M. Faguet. —LANSON, _Revue Politique_, 1894, i. 98. 

[65] It should teach us to disentangle principles first fromparties, and again from one another; first of all as showing howimperfectly all parties represent their own principles, and then howthe principles themselves are a mingled tissue. —ARNOLD, _ModernHistory_, 184. I find it a good rule, when I am contemplating a personfrom whom I want to learn, always to look out for his strength, beingconfident that the weakness will discover itself. —MAURICE, _Essays_, 305. We may seek for agreement somewhere with our neighbours, usingthat as a point of departure for the sake of argument. It is thislatter course that I wish here to explain and defend. The method issimple enough, though not yet very familiar. —It aims at conciliation;it proceeds by making the best of our opponent's case, instead oftaking him at his worst. —The most interesting part of every disputedquestion only begins to appear when the rival ideals admit eachother's right to exist. —A. SIDGWICK, _Distinction and the Criticismof Beliefs_, 1892, 211. That cruel reticence in the breasts of wisemen which makes them always hide their deeper thought. —RUSKIN, _Sesame and Lilies_, i. 16. Je offener wir die einzelnen Wahrheitendes Sozialismus anerkennen, desto erfolgreicher können wir seinefundamentalen Unwahrheiten widerlegen. —ROSCHER, _DeutscheVierteljahrschrift_, 1849, i. 177. 

[66] Dann habe ihn die Wahrnehmung, dass manche Angaben inden historischen Romanen Walter Scott's, mit den gleichzeitigenQuellen im Widerspruch standen, “mit Erstaunen” erfüllt, und ihn zudem Entschlusse gebracht, auf das Gewissenhafteste an derUeberlieferung der Quellen festzuhalten. —SYBEL, _Gedächtnissrede aufRanke_. _Akad. Der Wissenschaften_, 1887, p. 6. Sich frei zu haltenvon allem Widerschein der Gegenwart, sogar, soweit das menschenmöglich, von dem der eignen subjectiven Meinung in den Dingen des Staates, derKirche und der Gesellschaft. —A. DOVE, _Im Neuen Reich_, 1875, ii. 967. Wir sind durchaus nicht für die leblose und schemenartigeDarstellungsweise der Ranke'schen Schule eingenommen; es wird unsimmer kühl bis ans Herz heran, wenn wir derartige Schilderungen derReformation und der Revolution lesen, welche so ganz im kühlen Elementdes Pragmatismus sich bewegen und dabei so ganz Undinenhaft sind undkeine Seele haben. —Wir lassen es uns lieber gefallen, dass die Männerder Geschichte hier und dort gehofmeistert werden, als dass sie unsmit Glasaugen ansehen, so meisterhaft immer die Kunst sein mag die sieihnen eingesetzt hat. —GOTTSCHALL, _Unsere Zeit_, 1866, ii. 636, 637. Avivre avec des diplomates, il leur a pris des qualités qui sont undéfaut chez un historien. L'historien n'est pas un témoin, c'est unjuge; c'est à lui d'accuser et de condamner au nom du passé opprimé etdans l'intérêt de l'avenir. —LABOULAYE on RANKE. _Débats_, January 12, 1852. 

[67] Un théologien qui a composé une éloquente histoire de laRéformation, rencontrant à Berlin un illustre historien qui, luiaussi, a raconté Luther et le XVIe siècle, l'embrassa avec effusionen le traitant de confrère. “Ah! permettez, ” lui répondit l'autre ense dégageant, “il y a une grande différence entre nous: vous êtesavant tout chrétien, et je suis avant tout historien. ”—CHERBULIEZ, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1872, i. 537. 

[68] Nackte Wahrheit ohne allen Schmuck; gründlicheErforschung des Einzelnen; das Uebrige, Gott befohlen. —_Werke_, xxxiv. 24. Ce ne sont pas les théories qui doivent nous servir de basedans la recherche des faits, mais ce sont les faits qui doivent nousservir de base pour la composition des théories. —VINCENT, _NouvelleRevue de Théologie_, 1859, ii. 252. 

[69] Die zwanglose Anordnungs—die leichte und leiseAndeutungskunst des grossen Historikers voll zu würdigen, hinderte ihnin früherer Zeit sein Bedürfniss nach scharfer begrifflicher Ordnungund Ausführung, später, und in immer zunehmenden Grade, sein Sinn fürstrenge Sachlichkeit, und genaue Erforschung der ursächlichenZusammenhänge, noch mehr aber regte sich seine geradherzige Offenheitseine männliche Ehrlichkeit, wenn er hinter den fein verstrichenenFarben der Rankeschen Erzählungsbilder die gedeckte Haltung des klugenDiplomaten zu entdecken glaubte. —HAYM, _Duncker's Leben_, 437. Theground of criticism is indeed, in my opinion, nothing else butdistinct attention, which every reader should endeavour to be masterof. —HARE, _Dec. _, 1736, _Warburton's Works_, xiv. 98. Wenn dieQuellenkritik so verstanden wird, als sei sie der Nachweis, wie einAutor den andern benutzt hat, so ist das nur ein gelegentlichesMittel—eins unter anderen—ihre Aufgabe, den Nachweis der Richtigkeitzu lösen oder vorzubereiten. —DROYSEN, _Historik_, 18. 

[70] L'esprit scientifique n'est autre en soi que l'instinctdu travail et de la patience, le sentiment de l'ordre, de la réalitéet de la mesure. —PAPILLON, _R. Des Deux Mondes_, 1873, v. 704. Nonseulement les sciences, mais toutes les institutions humaines s'organisentde même, et sous l'empire des mêmes idées régulatrices. —COURNOT, _Idées Fondamentales_, i. 4. There is no branch of human work whoseconstant laws have not close analogy with those which govern everyother mode of man's exertion. But more than this, exactly as we reduceto greater simplicity and surety any one group of these practicallaws, we shall find them passing the mere condition of connection oranalogy, and becoming the actual expression of some ultimate nerve orfibre of the mighty laws which govern the moral world. —RUSKIN, _SevenLamps_, 4. The sum total of all intellectual excellence is good senseand method. When these have passed into the instinctive readiness ofhabit, when the wheel revolves so rapidly that we cannot see itrevolve at all, then we call the combination genius. But in all modesalike, and in all professions, the two sole component parts, even ofgenius, are good sense and method. —COLERIDGE, _June_, 1814, _Mem. OfColeorton_, ii. 172. Si l'exercice d'un art nous empêche d'enapprendre un autre, il n'en est pas ainsi dans les sciences: laconnoissance d'une vérité nous aide à en decouvrir une autre. —Toutesles sciences sont tellement liées ensemble qu'il est bien plus facilede les apprendre toutes à la fois que d'en apprendre une seule en ladétachant des autres. —Il ne doit songer qu'à augmenter les lumièresnaturelles de sa raison, non pour résoudre telle ou telle difficultéde l'école, mais pour que dans chaque circonstance de la vie sonintelligence montre d'avance à sa volonté le parti qu'elle doitprendre. —DESCARTES, _Œuvres Choisies_, 300, 301. _Règles pour laDirection de l'Esprit. _ La connaissance de la méthode qui a guidél'homme de génie n'est pas moins utile au progrès de la science etmême à sa propre gloire, que ses découvertes. —LAPLACE, _Système duMonde_, ii. 371. On ne fait rien sans idées préconçues, il faut avoirseulement la sagesse de ne croire à leurs déductions qu'autant quel'expérience les confirme. Les idées préconçues, soumises au contrôlesévère de l'expérimentation, sont la flamme vivante des sciencesd'observation; les idées fixes en sont le danger. —PASTEUR, in_Histoire d'un Savant_, 284. Douter des vérités humaines, c'est ouvrirla porte aux découvertes; en faire des articles de foi, c'est lafermer. —DUMAS, _Discours_, i. 123. 

[71] We should not only become familiar with the laws ofphenomena within our own pursuit, but also with the modes of thoughtof men engaged in other discussions and researches, and even with thelaws of knowledge itself, that highest philosophy. —Above all things, know that we call you not here to run your minds into our moulds. Wecall you here on an excursion, on an adventure, on a voyage ofdiscovery into space as yet uncharted. —ALLBUTT, _Introductory Addressat St. George's_, October 1889. Consistency in regard to opinions isthe slow poison of intellectual life. —DAVY, _Memoirs_, 68. 

[72] Ce sont vous autres physiologistes des corps vivants, qui avez appris à nous autres physiologistes de la société (qui estaussi un corps vivant) la manière de l'observer et de tirer desconséquences de nos observations. —J. B. SAY to DE CANDOLLE, June 1, 1827. —DE CANDOLLE, _Mémoires_, 567. 

[73] Success is certain to the pure and true: success tofalsehood and corruption, tyranny and aggression, is only the preludeto a greater and an irremediable fall. —STUBBS, _Seventeen Lectures_, 20. The Carlylean faith, that the cause we fight for, so far as it istrue, is sure of victory, is the necessary basis of all effectiveactivity for good. —CAIRD, _Evolution of Religion_, ii. 43. It is theproperty of truth to be fearless, and to prove victorious over everyadversary. Sound reasoning and truth, when adequately communicated, must always be victorious over error. —GODWIN, _Political Justice_(Conclusion). Vice was obliged to retire and give place to virtue. This will always be the consequence when truth has fair play. Falsehood only dreads the attack, and cries out for auxiliaries. Truthnever fears the encounter; she scorns the aid of the secular arm, andtriumphs by her natural strength. —FRANKLIN, _Works_, ii. 292. It is acondition of our race that we must ever wade through error in ouradvance towards truth: and it may even be said that in many cases weexhaust almost every variety of error before we attain the desiredgoal. —BABBAGE, _Bridgewater Treatise_, 27. Les hommes ne peuvent, enquelque genre que ce soit, arriver à quelque chose de raisonnablequ'après avoir, en ce même genre, épuisé toutes les sottisesimaginables. Que de sottises ne dirions-nous pas maintenant, si lesanciens ne les avaient pas déjà dites avant nous, et ne nous lesavaient, pour ainsi dire, enlevées!—FONTENELLE. Without prematuregeneralisations the true generalisation would never be arrived at. —H. SPENCER, _Essays_, ii. 57. The more important the subject ofdifference, the greater, not the less, will be the indulgence of himwho has learned to trace the sources of human error, —of error, thathas its origin not in our weakness and imperfection merely, but oftenin the most virtuous affections of the heart. —BROWN, _Philosophy ofthe Human Mind_, i. 48, 1824. Parmi les châtiments du crime qui ne luimanquent jamais, à côté de celui que lui inflige la conscience, l'histoire lui en inflige un autre encore, éclatant et manifeste, l'impuissance. —COUSIN, _Phil. Mod. _ ii. 24. L'avenir de la scienceest garanti; car dans le grand livre scientifique tout s'ajoute etrien ne se perd. L'erreur ne fonde pas; aucune erreur ne dure trèslongtemps. —RENAN, _Feuilles Détachées_, xiii. Toutes les fois quedeux hommes sont d'un avis contraire sur la même chose, à coup sûr, l'un ou l'autre se trompe; bien plus, aucun ne semble posséder lavérité; car si les raisons de l'un étoient certaines et évidentes, ilpourroit les exposer à l'autre de telle manière qu'il finiroit par leconvaincre également. —DESCARTES, _Règles: Œuvres Choisies_, 302. Le premier principe de la critique est qu'une doctrine ne captive sesadhérents que par ce qu'elle a de légitime. —RENAN, _Essais deMorale_, 184. Was dem Wahn solche Macht giebt ist wirklich nicht erselbst, sondern die ihm zu Grunde liegende und darin nur verzerrteWahrheit. —FRANTZ, _Schelling's Philosophie_, i. 62. Quand les hommesont vu une fois la vérité dans son éclat, ils ne peuvent plusl'oublier. Elle reste debout, et tôt ou tard elle triomphe, parcequ'elle est la pensée de Dieu et le besoin du monde. —MIGNET, _Portraits_, ii. 295. C'est toujours le sens commun inaperçu qui faitla fortune des hypothèses auxquelles il se mêle. —COUSIN, _FragmentsPhil. _ i. 51. Preface of 1826. Wer da sieht wie der Irrthum selbst einTräger mannigfaltigen und bleibenden Fortschritts wird, der wird auchnicht so leicht aus dem thatsächlichen Fortschritt der Gegenwart aufUnumstösslichkeit unserer Hypothesen schliessen. —Das richtigsteResultat der geschichtlichen Betrachtung ist die akademische Ruhe, mitwelcher unsere Hypothesen und Theorieen ohne Feindschaft und ohneGlauben als das betrachtet werden was sie sind; als Stufen in jenerunendlichen Annäherung an die Wahrheit, welche die Bestimmung unsererintellectuellen Entwicklung zu sein scheint. —LANGE, _Geschichte desMaterialismus_, 502, 503. Hominum errores divina providentia reguntur, ita ut sæpe male jacta bene cadant. —LEIBNIZ, ed. Klopp, i. , p. Lii. Sainte-Beuve n'était même pas de la race des libéraux, c'est-à-direde ceux qui croient que, tout compte fait, et dans un état decivilisation donné, le bien triomphe du mal à armes égales, et lavérité de l'erreur. —D'HAUSSONVILLE, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1875, i. 567. In the progress of the human mind, a period of controversyamongst the cultivators of any branch of science must necessarilyprecede the period of unanimity. —TORRENS, _Essay on the Production ofWealth_, 1821, p. Xiii. Even the spread of an error is part of thewide-world process by which we stumble into mere approximations totruth. —L. STEPHEN, _Apology of an Agnostic_, 81. Errors, to bedangerous, must have a great deal of truth mingled with them; it isonly from this alliance that they can ever obtain an extensivecirculation. —S. SMITH, _Moral Philosophy_, 7. The admission of thefew errors of Newton himself is at least of as much importance to hisfollowers in science as the history of the progress of his realdiscoveries. —YOUNG, _Works_, iii. 621. Error is almost always partialtruth, and so consists in the exaggeration or distortion of one verityby the suppression of another, which qualifies and modifies theformer. —MIVART, _Genesis of Species_, 3. The attainment of scientifictruth has been effected, to a great extent, by the help of scientificerrors. —HUXLEY: WARD, _Reign of Victoria_, ii. 337. Jede neue tiefeingreifende Wahrheit hat meiner Ansicht nach erst das Stadium derEinseitigkeit durchzumachen. —IHERING, _Geist des R. Rechts_, ii. 22. The more readily we admit the possibility of our own cherishedconvictions being mixed with error, the more vital and helpfulwhatever is right in them will become. —RUSKIN, _Ethics of the Dust_, 225. They hardly grasp the plain truth unless they examine the errorwhich it cancels. —CORY, _Modern English History_, 1880, i. 109. Nurdurch Irrthum kommen wir, der eine kürzeren und glücklicherenSchrittes, als der andere, zur Wahrheit; und die Geschichte darfnirgends diese Verirrungen übergehen, wenn sie Lehrerin und Warnerinfür die nachfolgenden Geschlechter werden will. —_Münchner Gel. Anzeigen_, 1840, i. 737. 

[74] Wie die Weltgeschichte das Weltgericht ist, so kann innoch allgemeinerem Sinne gesagt werden, dass das gerechte Gericht, d. H. Die wahre Kritik einer Sache, nur in ihrer Geschichte liegenkann. Insbesondere in der Hinsicht lehrt die Geschichte denjenigen, der ihr folgt, ihre eigene Methode, dass ihr Fortschritt niemals einreines Vernichten, sondern nur ein Aufheben im philosophischen Sinneist. —STRAUSS, _Hallische Jahrbücher_, 1839, 120. 

[75] Dans tous les livres qu'il lit, et il en dévore desquantités, Darwin ne note que les passages qui contrarient ses idéessystématiques. —Il collectionne les difficultés, les cas épineux, lescritiques possibles. —VERNIER, _Le Temps_, 6 Décembre, 1887. Jedemandais à un savant célèbre où il en était de ses recherches. “Celane marche plus, ” me dit-il, “je ne trouve plus de faitscontradictoires. ” Ainsi le savant cherche à se contredire lui-mêmepour faire avancer sa pensée. —JANET, _Journal des Savants_, 1892, 20. Ein Umstand, der uns die Selbständigkeit des Ganges der Wissenschaftanschaulich machen kann, ist auch der: dass der Irrthum, wenn er nurgründlich behandelt wird, fast ebenso fördernd ist als das Finden derWahrheit, denn er erzeugt fortgesetzten Widerspruch. —BAER, _Blickeauf die Entwicklung der Wissenschaft_, 120. It is only by virtue ofthe opposition which it has surmounted that any truth can stand in thehuman mind. —BISHOP TEMPLE; KINGLAKE, _Crimea_, _Winter Troubles_, app. 104. I have for many years found it expedient to lay down a rulefor my own practice, to confine my reading mainly to those journalsthe general line of opinions in which is adverse to my own. —HARE, _Means of Unity_, i. 19. Kant had a harder struggle with himself thanhe could possibly have had with any critic or opponent of hisphilosophy. —CAIRD, _Philosophy of Kant_, 1889, i. P. Ix. 

[76] The social body is no more liable to arbitrary changesthan the individual body. —A full perception of the truth that societyis not a mere aggregate, but an organic growth, that it forms a wholethe laws of whose growth can be studied apart from those of theindividual atom, supplies the most characteristic postulate of modernspeculation. —L. STEPHEN, _Science of Ethics_, 31. Wie in dem Lebendes Einzelnen Menschen kein Augenblick eines vollkommenen Stillstandeswahrgenommen wird, sondern stete organische Entwicklung, so verhält essich auch in dem Leben der Völker, und in jedem einzelnen Element, woraus dieses Gesammtleben besteht. So finden wir in der Sprache steteFortbildung und Entwicklung, und auf gleiche Weise in dem Recht. Undauch diese Fortbildung steht unter demselben Gesetz der Erzeugung ausinnerer Kraft und Nothwendigkeit, unabhängig von Zufall undindividueller Willkür, wie die ursprüngliche Entstehung. —SAVIGNY, _System_, i. 16, 17. Seine eigene Entdeckung, dass auch die geistigeProduktion, bis in einem gewissen Punkte wenigstens, unter dem Gesetzeder Kausalität steht, dass jedeiner nur geben kann was er hat, nur hatwas er irgendwoher bekommen, muss auch für ihn selber gelten. —BEKKER, _Das Recht des Besitzes bei den Römern_, 3, 1880. Die geschichtlicheWandlung des Rechts, in welcher vergangene Jahrhunderte halb ein Spieldes Zufalls und halb ein Werk vernünftelnder Willkür sahen, alsgesetzmässige Entwickelung zu begreifen, war das unsterblicheVerdienst der von Männern wie Savigny, Eichhorn und Jacob Grimmgeführten historischen Rechtsschule. —GIERKE, _Rundschau_, xviii. 205. 

[77] The only effective way of studying what is called thephilosophy of religion, or the philosophical criticism of religion, isto study the history of religion. The true science of war is thehistory of war, the true science of religion is, I believe, thehistory of religion. —M. MÜLLER, _Theosophy_, 3, 4. La théologie nedoit plus être que l'histoire des efforts spontanés tentés pourrésoudre le problème divin. L'histoire, en effet, est la formenécessaire de la science de tout ce qui est soumis aux lois de la viechangeante et successive. La science de l'esprit humain, c'est demême, l'histoire de l'esprit humain. —RENAN, _Averroës_, Pref. Vi. 

[78] Political economy is not a science, in any strict sense, but a body of systematic knowledge gathered from the study of commonprocesses, which have been practised all down the history of the humanrace in the production and distribution of wealth. —BONAMY PRICE, _Social Science Congress_, 1878. Such a study is in harmony with thebest intellectual tendencies of our age, which is, more than anythingelse, characterized by the universal supremacy of the historicalspirit. To such a degree has this spirit permeated all our modes ofthinking, that with respect to every branch of knowledge, no less thanwith respect to every institution and every form of human activity, wealmost instinctively ask, not merely what is its existing condition, but what were its earliest discoverable germs, and what has been thecourse of its development. —INGRAM, _History of Political Economy_, 2. Wir dagegen stehen keinen Augenblick an, die Nationalökonomie für einereine Erfahrungswissenschaft zu erklären, und die Geschichte ist unsdaher nicht Hülfsmittel, sondern Gegenstand selber. —ROSCHER, _Deutsche Vierteljahrschrift_, 1849, i. 182. Der bei weitem grössteTheil menschlicher Irrthümer beruhet darauf, dass man zeitlich undörtlich Wahres oder Heilsames für absolut wahr oder heilsam ausgiebt. Für jede Stufe der Volksentwickelung passt eine besondereStaatsverfassung, die mit allen übrigen Verhältnissen des Volks alsUrsache und Wirkung auf's Innigste verbunden ist; so passt auch fürjede Entwickelungsstufe eine besondere Landwirthschaftsverfassung. —ROSCHER, _Archiv f. P. Oek. _, viii. , 2 Heft 1845. Seitdem vor allen Roscher, Hildebrand und Knies den Werth, die Berechtigung und dieNothwendigkeit derselben unwiderleglich dargethan, hat sich immerallgemeiner der Gedanke Bahn gebrochen dass diese Wissenschaft, diebis dahin nur auf die Gegenwart, auf die Erkenntniss der bestehendenVerhältnisse und die in ihnen sichtbaren Gesetze den Blick gerichtethatte, auch in die Vergangenheit, in die Erforschung der bereitshinter uns liegenden wirthschaftlichen Entwicklung der Völker sichvertiefen müsse. —SCHÖNBERG, _Jahrbücher f. Nationalökonomie undStatistik_, Neue Folge, 1867, i. 1. Schmoller, moins dogmatique etmettant comme une sorte de coquetterie à être incertain, démontre, parles faits, la fausseté ou l'arbitraire de tous ces postulats, etlaisse l'économie politique se dissoudre dans l'histoire. —BRETON, _R. De Paris_, ix. 67. Wer die politische Oekonomie Feuerlands unterdieselben Gesetze bringen wollte mit der des heutigen Englands, würdedamit augenscheinlich nichts zu Tage fördern als den allerbanalstenGemeinplatz. Die politische Oekonomie ist somit wesentlich einehistorische Wissenschaft. Sie behandelt einen geschichtlichen, dasheisst einen stets wechselnden Stoff. Sie untersucht zunächst diebesondern Gesetze jeder einzelnen Entwicklungsstufe der Produktion unddes Austausches, und wird erst am Schluss dieser Untersuchung diewenigen, für Produktion und Austausch überhaupt geltenden, ganzallgemeinen Gesetze aufstellen können. —ENGELS, _Dührings Umwälzung derWissenschaft_, 1878, 121. 

[79] History preserves the student from being led astray by atoo servile adherence to any system. —WOLOWSKI. No system can beanything more than a history, not in the order of impression, but inthe order of arrangement by analogy. —DAVY, _Memoirs_, 68. Avec desmatériaux si nombreux et si importants, il fallait bien du couragepour résister à la tentation de faire un système. De Saussure eut cecourage, et nous en ferons le dernier trait et le trait principal deson éloge. —CUVIER, _Éloge de Saussure_, 1810. 

[80] C'était, en 1804, une idée heureuse et nouvelle, d'appeler l'histoire au secours de la science, d'interroger les deuxgrandes écoles rivales au profit de la vérité. —COUSIN, _FragmentsLittéraires_, 1843, 95, on Dégerando. No branch of philosophicaldoctrine, indeed, can be fairly investigated or apprehended apart fromits history. All our systems of politics, morals, and metaphysicswould be different if we knew exactly how they grew up, and whattransformations they have undergone; if we knew, in short, the truehistory of human ideas. —CLIFFE LESLIE, _Essays in Political and MoralPhilosophy_, 1879, 149. The history of philosophy must be rational andphilosophic. It must be philosophy itself, with all its elements, inall their relations, and under all their laws represented in strikingcharacters by the hands of time and of history, in the manifestedprogress of the human mind. —SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON, _Edin. Rev. _ l. 200, 1829. Il n'est point d'étude plus instructive, plus utile quel'étude de l'histoire de la philosophie; car on y apprend à sedésabuser des philosophes, et l'on y désapprend la fausse science deleurs systèmes. —ROYER COLLARD, _Œuvres de Reid_, iv. 426. On nepeut guère échapper à la conviction que toutes les solutions desquestions philosophiques n'aient été développées ou indiquées avant lecommencement du dix-neuvième siècle, et que par conséquent il ne soittrès difficile, pour ne pas dire impossible, de tomber, en pareillematière, sur une idée neuve de quelque importance. Or si cetteconviction est fondée, il s'ensuit que la science est faite. —JOUFFROY, in DAMIRON, _Philosophie du XIXe Siècle_, 363. Le but dernier de tousmes efforts, l'âme de mes écrits et de tout mon enseignement, c'estl'identité de la philosophie et de son histoire. —COUSIN, _Cours de1829_. Ma route est historique, il est vrai, mais mon but estdogmatique; je tends à une théorie, et cette théorie je la demande àl'histoire. —COUSIN, _Ph. Du XVIIIe Siècle_, 15. L'histoire de laphilosophie est contrainte d'emprunter d'abord à la philosophie lalumière qu'elle doit lui rendre un jour avec usure. —COUSIN, _Du Vrai_, 1855, 14. M. Cousin, durant tout son professorat de 1816 à 1829, apensé que l'histoire de la philosophie était la source de laphilosophie même. Nous ne croyons pas exagérer en lui prêtant cetteopinion. —B. ST. HILAIRE, _Victor Cousin_, i. 302. Il se hâta deconvertir le fait en loi, et proclama que la philosophie, étantidentique à son histoire, ne pouvait avoir une loi différente, etétait vouée à jamais à l'évolution fatale des quatre systèmes, secontredisant toujours, mais se limitant, et se modérant, par cela mêmede manière à maintenir l'equilibre, sinon l'harmonie de la penséehumaine. —VACHEROT, _Revue des Deux Mondes_, 1868, iii. 957. Er hatüberhaupt das unvergängliche Verdienst, zuerst in Frankreich zu derErkenntniss gelangt zu sein, dass die menschliche Vernunft nur durchdas Studium des Gesetzes ihrer Entwickelungen begriffen werdenkann. —LAUSER, _Unsere Zeit_, 1868, i. 459. Le philosophe en quête duvrai en soi, n'est plus réduit à ses conceptions individuelles; il estriche du trésor amassé par l'humanité. —BOUTROUX, _Revue Politique_, xxxvii. 802. L'histoire, je veux dire l'histoire de l'esprit humain, est en ce sens la vraie philosophie de notre temps. —RENAN, _Études deMorale_, 83. Die Philosophie wurde eine höchst bedeutendeHülfswissenschaft der Geschichte, sie hat ihre Richtung auf dasAllgemeine gefördert, ihren Blick für dasselbe geschärft, und sie, wenigstens durch ihre Vermittlung, mit Gesichtspuncten, Ideen, bereichert die sie aus ihrem eigenen Schoosse sobald noch nichterzeugt haben würde. Weit die fruchtbarste darunter war die aus derNaturwissenschaft geschöpfte Idee des organischen Lebens, dieselbe aufder die neueste Philosophie selbst beruht. Die seit zwei bis dreiJahrzehnten in der Behandlung der Geschichte eingetretenedurchgreifende Veränderung, wie die völlige Umgestaltung so mancheranderen Wissenschaft . . . Ist der Hauptsache nach ihr Werk. —HAUG, _Allgemeine Geschichte_, 1841, i. 22. Eine Geschichte der Philosophiein eigentlichen Sinne wurde erst möglich als man an die Stelle derPhilosophen deren Systeme setzte, den inneren Zusammenhang zwischendiesen feststellte und—wie Dilthey sagt—mitten in Wechsel derPhilosophien ein siegreiches Fortschreiten zur Wahrheit nachwies. DieGesammtheit der Philosophie stellt sich also dar als einegeschichtliche Einheit. —SAUL, _Rundschau_, Feb. 1894, 307. Warum diePhilosophie eine Geschichte habe und haben müsse, blieb unerörtert, jaungeahnt, dass die Philosophie am meisten von allen Wissenschaftenhistorisch sei, denn man hatte in der Geschichte den Begriff derEntwicklung nicht entdeckt. —MARBACH, _Griechische Philosophie_, 15. Was bei oberflächlicher Betrachtung nur ein Gewirre einzelner Personenund Meinungen zu sein schien, zeigt sich bei genauerer und gründlichererUntersuchung als eine geschichtliche Entwicklung, in der alles, baldnäher, bald entfernter, mit allem anderen zusammenhängt. —ZELLER, _Rundschau_, Feb. 1894, 307. Nur die Philosophie, die an diegeschichtliche Entwickelung anknüpft kann auf bleibenden Erfolg auchfür die Zukunft rechnen und fortschreiten zu dem, was in derbisherigen philosophischen Entwickelung nur erst unvollkommen erreichtoder angestrebt worden ist. Kann sich doch die Philosophie überhauptund insbesondere die Metaphysik ihrer eigenen geschichtlichenEntwickelung nicht entschlagen, sondern hat eine Geschichte derPhilosophie als eigene und zwar zugleich historische und spekulativeDisziplin, in deren geschichtlichen Entwickelungsphasen undgeschichtlich aufeinanderfolgenden Systemen der Philosophen die neuereSpekulation seit Schelling and Hegel zugleich die Philosophie selbstals ein die verschiedenen geschichtlichen Systeme umfassendes ganzesin seiner dialektischen Gliederung erkannt hat. —GLOATZ, _SpekulativeTheologie_, i. 23. Die heutige Philosophie führt uns auf einenStandpunkt von dem aus die philosophische Idee als das innere Wesender Geschichte selbst erscheint. So trat an die Stelle einer abstraktphilosophischen Richtung, welche das Geschichtliche verneinte, eineabstrakt geschichtliche Richtung welche das Philosophischeverläugnete. Beide Richtungen sind als überschrittene und besiegte zubetrachten. —BERNER, _Strafrecht_, 75. Die Geschichte der Philosophiehat uns fast schon die Wissenschaft der Philosophie selbstersetzt. —HERMANN, _Phil. Monatshefte_, ii. 198, 1889. 

[81] Le siècle actuel sera principalement caractérisé parl'irrévocable prépondérance de l'histoire, en philosophie, enpolitique, et même en poésie. —COMTE, _Politique Positive_, iii. 1. 

[82] The historical or comparative method has revolutionizednot only the sciences of law, mythology, and language, of anthropologyand sociology, but it has forced its way even into the domain ofphilosophy and natural science. For what is the theory of evolutionitself, with all its far-reaching consequences, but the achievement ofthe historical method?—PROTHERO, _Inaugural_. _National Review_, _Dec. _ 1894, 461. To facilitate the advancement of all the branches ofuseful science, two things seem to be principally requisite. The firstis, an historical account of their rise, progress, and present state. Without the former of these helps, a person every way qualified forextending the bounds of science labours under great disadvantages;wanting the lights which have been struck out by others, andperpetually running the risk of losing his labour, and finding himselfanticipated. —PRIESTLEY, _History of Vision_, 1772, i. Pref. I. Cuvier se proposait de montrer l'enchaînement scientifique desdécouvertes, leurs relations avec les grands évènements historiques, et leur influence sur les progrès et le développement de lacivilisation. —DARESTE, _Biographie Générale_, xii. 685. Dans seséloquentes leçons, l'histoire des sciences est devenue l'histoire mêmede l'esprit humain; car, remontant aux causes de leurs progrès et deleurs erreurs, c'est toujours dans les bonnes ou mauvaises routessuivies par l'esprit humain, qu'il trouve ces causes. —FLOURENS, _Éloge de Cuvier_, xxxi. Wie keine fortlaufende Entwickelungsreihe vonnur Einem Punkte aus vollkommen aufzufassen ist, so wird auch keinelebendige Wissenschaft nur aus der Gegenwart begriffen werdenkönnen. —Deswegen ist aber eine solche Darstellung doch noch nicht dergesammten Wissenschaft adäquat, und sie birgt, wenn sie damitverwechselt wird, starke Gefahren der Einseitigkeit, des Dogmatismusund damit der Stagnation in sich. Diesen Gefahren kann wirksam nurbegegnet werden durch die verständige Betrachtung der Geschichte derWissenschaften, welche diese selbst in stetem Flusse zeigt und dieTendenz ihres Fortschreitens in offenbarer und sicherer Weiseklarlegt. —ROSENBERGER, _Geschichte der Physik_, iii. , p. Vi. DieContinuität in der Ausbildung aller Auffassungen tritt um sodeutlicher hervor, je vollständiger man sich damit, wie sie zuverschiedenen Zeiten waren, vertraut macht. —KOPP, _Entwickelung derChemie_, 814. 

[83] Die Geschichte und die Politik sind Ein und derselbeJanus mit dem Doppelgesicht, das in der Geschichte in dieVergangenheit, in der Politik in die Zukunft hinschaut. —GÜGLER'S_Leben_, ii. 59. 

[84] The papers inclosed, which give an account of thekilling of two men in the county of Londonderry; if they prove to beTories, 'tis very well they are gone. —I think it will not only benecessary to grant those a pardon who killed them, but also that theyhave some reward for their own and others' encouragement. —ESSEX, _Letters_, 10, _Jan. _ 10, 1675. The author of this happened to bepresent. There was a meeting of some honest people in the city, uponthe occasion of the discovery of some attempt to stifle the evidenceof the witnesses. —Bedloe said he had letters from Ireland, that therewere some Tories to be brought over hither, who were privately tomurder Dr. Oates and the said Bedloe. The doctor, whose zeal was veryhot, could never after this hear any man talk against the plot, oragainst the witnesses, but he thought he was one of these Tories, andcalled almost every man a Tory that opposed him in discourse; till atlast the word Tory became popular. —DEFOE, _Edinburgh Review_, l. 403. 

[85] La España será el primer pueblo en donde se encenderáesta guerra patriotica que solo puede libertar á Europa. —Hemos oidoesto en Inglaterra á varios de los que estaban alli presentes. Muchasveces ha oido lo mismo al duque de Wellington el general Don Miguel deAlava, y dicho duque refirió el suceso en una comida diplomatica quedió en Paris el duque de Richelieu en 1816. —TORENO, _Historia delLevantamiento de España_, 1838, i. 508. 

[86] Nunquam propter auctoritatem illorum, quamvis magni sintnominis (supponimus scilicet semper nos cum eo agere qui scientiamhistoricam vult consequi), sententias quas secuti sunt ipse tamquamcertas admittet, sed solummodo ob vim testimoniorum et argumentorumquibus eas confirmarunt. —DE SMEDT, _Introductio ad historiam criticetractandam_, 1866, i. 5. 

[87] Hundert schwere Verbrechen wiegen nicht so schwer in derSchale der Unsittlichkeit, als ein unsittliches Princip. —_HallischeJahrbücher_, 1839, 308. Il faut flétrir les crimes; mais il fautaussi, et surtout, flétrir les doctrines et les systèmes qui tendent àles justifier. —MORTIMER TERNAUX, _Histoire de la Terreur_. 

[88] We see how good and evil mingle in the best of men andin the best of causes; we learn to see with patience the men whom welike best often in the wrong, and the repulsive men often in theright; we learn to bear with patience the knowledge that the causewhich we love best has suffered, from the awkwardness of itsdefenders, so great disparagement, as in strict equity to justify themen who were assaulting it. —STUBBS, _Seventeen Lectures_, 97. 

[89] Caeteris paribus, on trouvera tousjours que ceux qui ontplus de puissance sont sujets à pécher davantage; et il n'y a point dethéorème de géométrie qui soit plus asseuré que cette proposition. —LEIBNIZ, 1688, ed. Rommel, ii. 197. Il y a toujours eu de la malignité dans lagrandeur, et de l'opposition à l'esprit de l'Évangile; mais maintenantil y en a plus que jamais, et il semble que comme le monde va à safin, celui qui est dans l'élévation fait tous ses efforts pourdominer avec plus de tyrannie, et pour étouffer les maximes duChristianisme et le règne de Jésus-Christ, voiant qu'il s'approche. —GODEAU, _Lettres_, 423, March 27, 1667. There is, in fact, an unconquerabletendency in all power, save that of knowledge, acting by and throughknowledge, to injure the mind of him by whom that power isexercised. —WORDSWORTH, June 22, 1817. _Letters of Lake Poets_, 369. 

[90] I cieli han messo sulla terra due giudici delle umaneazioni, la coscienza e la storia. —COLLETTA. Wenn gerade die edelstenMänner um des Nachruhmes willen gearbeitet haben, so soll dieGeschichte ihre Belohnung sein, sie auch die Strafe für dieSchlechten. —LASAULX, _Philosophie der Künste_, 211. Pour juger ce quiest bon et juste dans la vie actuelle ou passée, il faut posséder uncriterium, qui ne soit pas tiré du passé ou du présent, mais de lanature humaine. —AHRENS, _Cours de Droit Naturel_, i. 67. 

[91] L'homme de notre temps! La conscience moderne! Voilàencore de ces termes qui nous ramènent la prétendue philosophie del'histoire et la doctrine du progrès, quand il s'agit de la justice, c'est-à-dire de la conscience pure et de l'homme rationnel, qued'autres siècles encore que le nôtre ont connu. —RENOUVIER, _Crit. Phil. _ 1873, ii. 55. 

[92] Il faut pardonner aux grands hommes le marchepied deleur grandeur. —COUSIN, in J. SIMON, _Nos Hommes d'État_, 1887, 55. L'esprit du XVIIIe siècle n'a pas besoin d'apologie: l'apologie d'unsiècle est dans son existence. —COUSIN, _Fragments_, iii. 1826. Suspendus aux lèvres éloquentes de M. Cousin, nous l'entendîmess'écrier que la meilleure cause l'emportait toujours, que c'était laloi de l'histoire, le rhythme immuable du progrès. —GASPARIN, _LaLiberté Morale_, ii. 63. Cousin verurtheilen heisst darum nichtsAnderes als jenen Geist historischer Betrachtung verdammen, durchwelchen das 19 Jahrhundert die revolutionäre Kritik des 18Jahrhunderts ergänzt, durch welchen insbesondere Deutschland diegeistigen Wohlthaten vergolten hat, welche es im Zeitalter derAufklärung von seinen westlichen Nachbarn empfangen. —IODL, _Gesch. Der Ethik_, ii. 295. Der Gang der Weltgeschichte steht ausserhalb derTugend, des Lasters, und der Gerechtigkeit. —HEGEL, _Werke_, viii. 425. Die Vermischung des Zufälligen im Individuum mit dem an ihmHistorischen führt zu unzähligen falschen Ansichten und Urtheilen. Hierzu gehört namentlich alles Absprechen über die moralischeTüchtigkeit der Individuen, und die Verwunderung, welche his zurVerzweiflung an göttlicher Gerechtigkeit sich steigert, dasshistorisch grosse Individuen moralisch nichtswürdig erscheinen können. Die moralische Tüchtigkeit besteht in der Unterordnung alles dessenwas zufällig am Einzelnen unter das an ihm dem AllgemeinenAngehörige. —MARBACH, _Geschichte der Griechischen Philosophie_, 7. Das Sittliche der Neuseeländer, der Mexikaner ist vielmehr ebensosittlich, wie das der Griechen, der Römer; und das Sittliche derChristen des Mittelalters ist ebenso sittlich, wie das derGegenwart. —KIRCHMANN, _Grundbegriffe des Rechts_, 194. DieGeschichtswissenschaft als solche kennt nur ein zeitliches und mithinauch nur ein relatives Maass der Dinge. Alle Werthbeurtheilung derGeschichte kann daher nur relativ und aus zeitlichen Momentenfliessen, und wer sich nicht selbst täuschen und den Dingen nichtGewalt anthun will, muss ein für allemal in dieser Wissenschaft aufabsolute Werthe verzichten. —LORENZ, _Schlosser_, 80. Only accordingto his faith is each man judged. Committed as this deed has been by apure-minded, pious youth, it is a beautiful sign of the time. —DEWETTE to Sand's Mother, CHEYNE, _Founders of Criticism_, 44. The menof each age must be judged by the ideal of their own age and country, and not by the ideal of ours. —LECKY, _Value of History_, 50. 

[93] La durée ici-bas, c'est le droit, c'est la sanction deDieu. —GUIRAUD, _Philosophie Catholique de l'Histoire_. 

[94] Ceux qui ne sont pas contens de l'ordre des choses nesçauroient se vanter d'aimer Dieu comme il faut. —Il faut toujoursestre content de l'ordre du passé, parce qu'il est conforme à lavolonté de Dieu absolue, qu'on connoit par l'évènement. Il faut tâcherde rendre l'avenir, autant qu'il dépend de nous, conforme à la volontéde Dieu présomptive. —LEIBNIZ, _Werke_, ed. Gerhardt, ii. 136. Ichhabe damals bekannt und bekenne jetzt, dass die politische Wahrheitaus denselben Quellen zu schöpfen ist, wie alle anderen, aus demgöttlichen Willen und dessen Kundgebung in der Geschichte desMenschengeschlechts. —RADOWITZ, _Neue Gespräche_, 65. 

[95] A man is great as he contends best with thecircumstances of his age. —FROUDE, _Short Studies_ i. 388. Lapersuasion que l'homme est avant tout une personne morale et libre, etqu'ayant conçu seul, dans sa conscience et devant Dieu, la règle de saconduite, il doit s'employer tout entier à l'appliquer en lui, hors delui, absolument, obstinément, inflexiblement, par une résistanceperpétuelle opposée aux autres; et par une contrainte perpétuelleexercée sur soi, voilà la grande idée anglaise. —TAINE; SOREL, _Discours de Réception_, 24. In jeder Zeit des Christenthums hat eseinzelne Männer gegeben, die über ihrer Zeit standen und von ihrenGegensätzen nicht berührt wurden. —BACHMANN, _Hengstenberg_, i. 160. Eorum enim qui de iisdem rebus mecum aliquid ediderunt, aut solusinsanio ego, aut solus non insanio; tertium enim non est, nisi (quoddicet forte aliquis) insaniamus omnes. —HOBBES, quoted by DE MORGAN, June 3, 1858, _Life of Sir W. R. Hamilton_, iii. 552. 

[96] I have now to exhibit a rare combination of goodqualities, and a steady perseverance in good conduct, which raised anindividual to be an object of admiration and love to all hiscontemporaries, and have made him to be regarded by succeedinggenerations as a model of public and private virtue. —The evidenceshows that upon this occasion he was not only under the influence ofthe most vulgar credulity, but that he violated the plainest rules ofjustice, and that he really was the murderer of two innocentwomen. —Hale's motives were most laudable. —CAMPBELL'S _Lives of theChief Justices_, i. 512, 561, 566. It was not to be expected of thecolonists of New England that they should be the first to see througha delusion which befooled the whole civilized world, and the gravestand most knowing persons in it. —The people of New England believedwhat the wisest men of the world believed at the end of theseventeenth century. —PALFREY, _New England_, iv. 127, 129 (alsospeaking of witchcraft). Il est donc bien étrange que sa sévéritétardive s'exerce aujourd'hui sur un homme auquel elle n'a d'autrereproche à faire que d'avoir trop bien servi l'état par des mesurespolitiques, injustes peut-être, violentes, mais qui, en aucunemanière, n'avaient l'intérêt personnel du coupable pour objet. —M. Hastings peut sans doute paraître répréhensible aux yeux desétrangers, des particuliers même, mais il est assez extraordinairequ'une nation usurpatrice d'une partie de l'Indostan veuille mêler lesrègles de la morale à celles d'une administration forcée, injuste etviolente par essence, et à laquelle il faudrait renoncer à jamais pourêtre conséquent. —MALLET DU PAN, _Memories_, ed. Sayous, i. 102. 

[97] On parle volontiers de la stabilité de la constitutionanglaise. La vérité est que cette constitution est toujours enmouvement et en oscillation et qu'elle se prête merveilleusement aujeu de ses différentes parties. Sa solidité vient de sa souplesse;elle plie et ne rompt pas. —BOUTMY, _Nouvelle Revue_, 1878, 49. 

[98] This is not an age for a man to follow the strictmorality of better times, yet sure mankind is not yet so debased butthat there will ever be found some few men who will scorn to joinconcert with the public voice when it is not well grounded. —_SavileCorrespondence_, 173. 

[99] Cette proposition: L'homme est incomparablement plusporté au mal qu'au bien, et il se fait dans le monde incomparablementplus de mauvaises actions que de bonnes—est aussi certaine qu'aucunprincipe de métaphysique. Il est donc incomparablement plus probablequ'une action faite par un homme, est mauvaise, qu'il n'est probablequ'elle soit bonne. Il est incomparablement plus probable que cessecrets ressorts qui l'ont produite sont corrompus, qu'il n'estprobable qu'ils soient honnêtes. Je vous avertis que je parle d'uneaction qui n'est point mauvaise extérieurement. —BAYLE, _Œuvres_, ii. 248. 

[100] A Christian is bound by his very creed to suspect evil, and cannot release himself. —His religion has brought evil to light ina way in which it never was before; it has shown its depth, subtlety, ubiquity; and a revelation, full of mercy on the one hand, is terriblein its exposure of the world's real state on the other. The Gospelfastens the sense of evil upon the mind; a Christian is enlightened, hardened, sharpened, as to evil; he sees it where others donot. —MOZLEY, _Essays_, i. 308. All satirists, of course, work in thedirection of Christian doctrine, by the support they give to thedoctrine of original sin, making a sort of meanness and badness a lawof society. —MOZLEY, _Letters_, 333. Les critiques, même malveillants, sont plus près de la vérité dernière que les admirateurs. —NISARD, _Lit. Fr. _, Conclusion. Les hommes supérieurs doivent nécessairementpasser pour méchants. Où les autres ne voient ni un défaut, ni unridicule, ni un vice, leur implacable œil l'aperçoit. —BARBEYD'AUREVILLY, _Figaro_, March 31, 1888. 

[101] Prenons garde de ne pas trop expliquer, pour ne pasfournir des arguments à ceux qui veulent tout excuser. —BROGLIE, _Réception de Sorel_, 46. 

[102] The eternal truths and rights of things exist, fortunately, independent of our thoughts or wishes, fixed asmathematics, inherent in the nature of man and the world. They are nomore to be trifled with than gravitation. —FROUDE, _Inaugural Lectureat St. Andrews_, 1869, 41. What have men to do with interests? Thereis a right way and a wrong way. That is all we need thinkabout. —CARLYLE to FROUDE, _Longman's Magazine_, Dec. 1892, 151. As toHistory, it is full of indirect but very effective moral teaching. Itis not only, as Bolingbroke called it, “Philosophy teaching byexamples, ” but it is morality teaching by examples. —It is essentiallythe study which best helps the student to conceive large thoughts. —Itis impossible to overvalue the moral teaching of History. —FITCH, _Lectures on Teaching_, 432. Judging from the past history of ourrace, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, war is a folly and acrime. —Where it is so, it is the saddest and the wildest of allfollies, and the most heinous of all crimes. —GREG, _Essays onPolitical and Social Science_, 1853, i. 562. La volonté de tout unpeuple ne peut rendre juste ce qui est injuste: les représentantsd'une nation n'ont pas le droit de faire ce que la nation n'a pas ledroit de faire elle-même. —B. CONSTANT, _Principes de Politique_, i. 15. 

[103] Think not that morality is ambulatory; that vices inone age are not vices in another, or that virtues, which are under theeverlasting seal of right reason, may be stamped by opinion. —SIRTHOMAS BROWNE, _Works_, iv. 64. 

[104] Osons croire qu'il seroit plus à propos de mettre decôté ces traditions, ces usages, et ces coutumes souvent siimparfaites, si contradictoires, si incohérentes, ou de ne lesconsulter que pour saisir les inconvéniens et les éviter; et qu'ilfaudroit chercher non-seulement les éléments d'une nouvellelégislation, mais même ses derniers détails dans une étude approfondiede la morale. —LETROSNE, _Réflexions sur la Législation Criminelle_, 137. M. Renan appartient à cette famille d'esprits qui ne croient pasen réalité la raison, la conscience, le droit applicables à ladirection des sociétés humaines, et qui demandent à l'histoire, à latradition, non à la morale, les règles de la politique. Ces espritssont atteints de la maladie du siècle, le scepticisme moral. —PILLON, _Critique Philosophique_, i. 49. 

[105] The subject of modern history is of all others, to mymind, the most interesting, inasmuch as it includes all questions ofthe deepest interest relating not to human things only, but todivine. —ARNOLD, _Modern History_, 311.