Studies in Literature and History
close proximity to the scenes which he described; and the conclusion
of his history marks the fall of the curtain on a drama of which the
final acts are still to be played out.
FOOTNOTES:
[54] _Proceedings of the British Academy_, vol. iii.
REMARKS ON THE READING OF HISTORY[55]
Since I have accepted, at the request of your Warden, the honour of
delivering an inaugural address on this occasion, it has appeared to
me appropriate to choose, for such an audience, some literary subject.
And I propose, with some diffidence, to offer a few observations on
the reading of history, because in these latter days, when education
has come in upon us like a flood, rising higher and spreading wider
every year among our people, no part of literature is more sedulously
studied than the field of history. On the other hand, this field is
being very rapidly enlarged. It has been said that the output of
histories during the nineteenth century has exceeded in bulk and
volume the production of all previous centuries. And in all the
countries now standing in the forefront of civilisation, the chief
product of their serious literature is at this time historical and
biographical--for I take authentic biography to be a kind of handmaid
of history. It has been reported that during the ten years ending 1907
there were published in England 5498 books under the head of history,
and 1059 biographies. Moreover, of those who are not actually writing
history, an important number are occupied in criticising the
historians.
Now the first observation that I submit to you is that the production
of all history has been almost entirely the work of Europeans, among
whom I reckon the American writers, as belonging by language and
culture to Europe. So far as the African continent has any trustworthy
history, it is in some European language. In Asia there have been
annalists, chroniclers, and genealogists, mostly Mohammedan, who
narrate the wars and exploits of great conquerors, the succession of
kings, and the rise and fall of dynasties. And I believe that in China
official record of public events and transactions has been kept up
from very early ages. But if we measure these Asiatic narratives by
the standard of literary merit and the demand for authentication of
facts, I fear that they will be found wanting; though they may be
relied upon to give the general course of important events, and an
outline of the result of battles and the upsetting of thrones.
When these Asiatic chroniclers wrote of the times in and near which
they were living, they were fairly trustworthy. But whenever they
attempted to write of times long past and of countries unknown to them
personally, their narratives became for the most part fabulous and
romantic, confused and improbable, with some grains of truth here and
there. Our best information regarding the earlier ages of Asia is
derived, I think, from Greek and Latin literature, and latterly from
the researches of quite modern scholars and archaeologists. So that it
may be affirmed that authentic history began in Europe, and that to
Europe it has ever since been practically confined. At this day the
history of all parts of the world is being written by Europeans. The
result has been that for the last 2500 years historical material,
collected from and relating to all parts of the world, has been
accumulating in Europe.
Such masses of records and monuments necessarily require methodical
treatment by men of trained intelligence and of untiring industry,
learned, and accurate. Their systematic labours, their acute and
intelligent criticism, have created what is now usually termed the
Science of History, which abstracts general conclusions from the mass
of particulars. And so, I think, we may agree with Renan, who has
declared that to the nineteenth century may be accorded the title of
the Age of Historians, and that this has been the special distinction
of that century's literature.
Now I believe that the question, whether history is an art or a
science, is not yet universally settled. But whatever may be the case
in these modern days, I submit that in earlier times, and certainly
when history began to be written, it was mainly an art. Indeed, it
could hardly have been otherwise. In all ages and countries, from the
time when men first attained to some stage of elementary culture, they
have been curious about the past, they have enjoyed hearing of the
deeds and fame of their ancestors, of far-off things and battles long
ago. But the primitive chronicler had very slight material for his
stories of bygone times--he had few, if any, documents--he was himself
creating the documentary evidence for those who came after him; he
could only compile his narratives from tradition, legends, anecdotes
of heroic ancestors, from information picked up by travel to famous
places, and so on. Yet from sources of this kind he composed tales of
inestimable value as representing the ideas, habits, and social
condition of preceding generations that were very like his own.
Herodotus, who is our best example of the class, reconstructs,
revives, and relates conversations that neither he nor his informants
could have actually heard; but he does this in order to give a
dramatic version of great events. In the opening sentence of his first
book he says that he has written in order that the actions of men may
not be effaced by time, nor great and wondrous deeds be deprived of
renown. And one may notice the same style and method in the
historical books of the Old Testament. In both these ancient histories
the narratives represent life, action, speech, situations.
It is futile, I may suggest, to subject work of this sort to critical
analysis by attempting to sift out what is probably true from what is
certainly false. You only break up the picture, you destroy the
artistic effect, which is at least a true reflection of real life.
Moreover, it is dangerous for learned men sitting in libraries to
regard as incredible facts stated by these old writers. The legend of
Romulus and Remus having been suckled by a wolf has been dismissed as
a childish fable. Yet it is certain that this very thing has happened
more than once in the forests of India within the memory of living
men. You cannot be particular about details, you must take the story
as a whole.
From this standpoint we may agree, I think, that in illiterate times,
and, indeed, throughout the middle ages of Europe, history-writing was
practised as an art. The unlearned chronicler wrote in no fear of
critics or sceptics; he drew striking scenes and portraits; he
described warlike exploits; he related characteristic sayings and
dialogues which completely satisfied his audience or his readers. The
society in which he lived was not far different, in morals and
manners, from that which he portrayed, so that he can have committed
very few anachronisms or incongruities; and in sentiments and
character-drawing he could not go far astray. He produced, at any
rate, vivid impressions of reality, just as Shakespeare's historical
plays have stamped upon the English mind the figures of Hotspur or
Richard III., which have been thus set up in permanent type for all
subsequent ages. At any rate portraits of this kind have not been
modernised to suit the taste of a later age, as has been done with
King Arthur in Tennyson's 'Idylls of the King.' And when work of this
sort has been finely executed, the question whether the details are
untrustworthy or even fictitious is immaterial, particularly in cases
where the precise facts can never be recovered. We do not know exactly
how the battle of Marathon, or, indeed, the battle of Hastings, was
fought, but we have in the chronicles something of great value--a true
outline of the general situation, and some stirring narratives of the
clash and wrestling of armed men, compiled either at first hand from
the recollections of those who were actually on the field, or else
taken at second hand from others who made notes of what had been told
them by those present at the battles. This, then, is what I meant when
I said that in early times history was an art. Its method was
picturesque.
Now my next observation is that, although the science of history has
since been invented, we have, among quite modern English writers, men
of singular genius, who have to some extent followed the example,
adopted the manner, of the ancient annalist. Like him, they are
artists, their aim has been to depict famous men, to reproduce
striking incidents and scenes dramatically. Their technical methods,
so to speak, are entirely different from those of the old chronicler,
who sketched with a free hand, and trusted largely to his
inspirations, to his own experience of what was likely to have been
said or done, or to popular tradition, which is always animated and
distinct. The modern historian, of what I may call the school of
impressionists, has no such experience, he knows nothing personally of
violent scenes or fierce deeds; he composes his picture of things that
happened long ago from a mass of papers, books, memoirs, that have
come down to us. Yet although style and substance are quite different,
the chief aim, the design, of the ancient and modern artist in
history is the same. They both strive to set before their reader a
vision of certain scenes and figures at moments of energetic
action--not only to tell him a story, but to make him see it. Let me
give an example. Every one here may remember the story in the Old
Testament (2nd Book of Kings) of Jehu driving furiously into Jezreel,
how on his way he smote Ahaziah, king of Judah, with an arrow, and how
Jezebel, the Phoenician Queen, was hurled down out of her palace
window to be devoured by dogs in the street. And some of you may have
read in Froude's _History of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth_ his
description of the murder of David Rizzio by the fierce Scotch nobles,
how he was killed clinging to Queen Mary's knees in her chamber in
Holyrood Palace. Now the manner, the artistic presentation of
ferocious action, are in both cases alike; we have the words spoken
and the deeds done; we can look on at the bloody tragedy; we have a
dramatic version of the story. The ancient writer of the Old Testament
probably did his work naturally, instinctively; he tells the story as
he received it by word of mouth, briefly--laying stress only on the
things that cut into the imagination of an eye-witness, and remain in
the memory of those to whom they were related. He troubles us with no
moral reflections, but goes on quietly to the next chapter of
incidents. The modern historian has composed his picture from details
collected by study of documents; he puts in adjectives as a painter
lays on colour; yet the effect, the impression, is of the same
quality: it is artistic.
Now the principal English historians of the modern school, who revived
what one may call the dramatic presentation of history, I take to be
Macaulay, Froude, and Carlyle. They all worked upon genuine material,
upon authentic records of the period which they were writing about.
Lord Acton mentions that Froude spoke of having consulted 100,000
papers in manuscript, at home and abroad, for one of his histories.
Macaulay was industrious and indefatigable. Yet Ranke, the great
German historian, said of Macaulay that he could hardly be called a
historian at all, judged by the strict tests of German criticism. And
Freeman, the English historian, brought violent charges against Froude
of deliberately twisting his facts and misquoting his authorities;
though I believe that Freeman's bitter jealousies led him into grave
exaggerations. Then take Carlyle. His Cromwell is a fine portrait by
an eminent literary artist. But is it a genuine delineation of the man