OF THE VARIOUS METHODS OF WRITING HISTORY.

16

CHARACTERISTICS OF ANCIENT HISTORY.

before him. To great moral truths, in action, belong great force and beauty of description.

CHAPTER VI.

The philosophical spirit of history is, to a certain Characteristics of Ancient History.-Herodotus. extent, placed in opposition to the poetical spirit. The latter looks chiefly at the visible forms, the for- AMONG the ancients, history was first regarded only mer upon the abstract laws of existence. The one is as the art of weaving an amusing narrative out of the apt to be warmed and transported into the regions common and vulgar recollection of events. From the of mere imagination, the other to fall into the profound research of materials, the early writers were, cold and blank generalities of speculation. In ancient times, the poetical spirit was carried to a faulty extreme; in our days, it is the philosophical part of history which is overcharged. A good history should combine both, in a moderate degree. Philosophy is nothing more than an attempt to trace the relation of cause and effect, to discover in particular actions the operation of general principles, to perceive the one in the many, and thence to foresee the many from the one. Philosophy is the root, poetry is the flower; one works in darkness and difficulty, the other expands in beauty, splendor, and light.

The purely historical spirit ought, doubtless, to predominate in the writing of history, but it is not of itself sufficient to form a historian. Many an old chronicler has recorded, with the most scrupulous fidelity, the occurrences of his age, and has even displayed a zeal in collecting information, and a pride in communicating it, which are in themselves highly laudable. But these works have not merited the name of history, because they have neither been calculated for instruction nor amusement. The love of truth is the first duty of the historian, but it is not his whole duty. In laying before us the occurrences of past times, he must animate and excite our feelings by powerful descriptions, and he must exercise our habits of reflection, by appropriate remarks on the causes and consequences of the events related.

To write history in the ordinary manner, that is, to relate events just as they occurred, to abbreviate statepapers, to sketch characters of great men, to indulge in common moral reflections on the changes of human affairs, and to intersperse praise and censure in the narrative, may be a comparatively easy task, and within the range of ordinary abilities. But to be a really great historian is, perhaps, the rarest of intellectual distinctions. Many scientific works are perfect in their kind; many poems are almost faultless; many rhetorical compositions are so excellent, that no mortal skill appears able to alter them, except for the worse. But a perfect history, or even one which makes a close approach to perfection, the world has

never yet seen.

no doubt, debarred, because few traces of events in early times were left in writing. But the ancient historians appear to have had little or no conception of the dependence of the events which they relate upon the most remarkable of their causes upon the state of government, and upon the condition of society among the people to whom the events related. They tell us how one people made war upon another people, and that incidents of such and such a description ensued; but the instruction afforded by these tales is soon exhausted.

It was not till after many attempts in writing history had been made, that authors learned to give a new value to their narratives, by showing, in their details of political transactions, how nations were guided towards their real interests, and how they were led astray from them; what were the chief circumstances by which they were deceived in the schemes for their own welfare; how they suffered by their mistakes, and how they were led to the knowledge of the true object of government and social institutions.

Herodotus has been called the father of history. He formed the plan of his work with an uncommon The cause of this may be easily assigned. The which he wrote. Taking for the basis of his history degree of art and judgment, considering the age in province of literature lies in the domain both of the rea- the wars of the Greeks and Persians, he united with son and the imagination; it is sometimes fiction and it a great variety of incidents, by retracing the power sometimes theory. A perfect historian must possess an of the two belligerent nations from the earliest known imagination sufficiently powerful to make his narra- sources. Thus he successively introduces the history tive affecting and picturesque, yet he must control it of the Lydians, Medes, Babylonians, Egyptians, Scythso absolutely, as to content himself with the materials ians and Hindoos. After this, he returns to his which he finds in existence, and to refrain from sup- main object, and concludes with the glorious victories plying deficiencies by additions of his own. He must obtained by his countrymen at Salamis and Therbe a profound and ingenious reasoner; yet he must possess sufficient self-command to abstain from wrest-mopyla. He is the earliest and best of all the poetical or romantic historians. His animation, his simpleing facts to support a hypothesis. The union of these hearted tenderness, his wonderful talent for description two powers cannot often be found in any individual and dialogue, and the pure, sweet flow of his language, combined with the other qualifications necessary to place him at the head of narrators. form a historian.

Yet the work of Herodotus cannot be called a good history, in the more rigid sense of the word. The

THUCYDIDES-XENOPHON-POLYBIUS-LIVY-SALLUST.

CHAPTER VII.

Sallust- Tacitus.

17

author is rather an inventor than a historian. Incomparable as his book is, considered merely in the light of an amusing narrative, it lacks authenticity. There Thucydides - Xenophon - Polybius - Livyare not only gross fictions in it, but the whole narrative has a romantic and fictitious coloring, which leaves the most sagacious reader in doubt what to believe and what to reject. There are very long passages in Herodotus, where everything is told, almost as dramatically as the events in the historical plays of Shakspeare. The great occurrences are, no doubt, faithfully related; so, probably, are many of the imagination. His history exhibits all the appearance slighter circumstances, but which of them, it is impossible to determine. The faults of Herodotus are those of a simple and imaginative mind. He wrote as it was natural that he should write. His work was designed for a nation susceptible, curious, lively, and insatiably desirous of novelty and excitement; for a nation in which the fine arts had attained a high degree of excellence, but in which philosophy was still in its infancy.

The Greeks, in the time of Herodotus, had but re

cently begun to cultivate prose composition; public transactions had been generally recorded in verse. The first historians might, therefore, indulge, without fear of censure, in the license allowed to poets. The inquisitive and credulous countrymen of Herodotus were easily moved by religious awe or patriotic enthusiasm. They were the very men to hear with delight of strange beasts, and birds, and trees; of dwarfs, giants and cannibals; of gods whose very name it was impiety to utter; of ancient dynasties which had left behind them monuments surpassing all the works of later times; of stupendous cities and walls and temples and pyramids; of predictions accomplished; of dreams and omens, and warnings from the dead; and of infants strangely preserved from the dagger of the assassin to fulfil high destinies.

HERODOTUS was followed by Thucydides, a writer from that of his predecessor, as a portrait differs from totally distinct in style and plan. His history differs an imaginary scene, on canvass. He was a sagacious and reflecting man, who never gave the reins to his of the strictest fidelity, and the most punctual adherhis reflections are acute and discriminating. He wrote ence to truth. His style is compact and forcible, and the history of his own time, and of the events in which he was personally engaged. He borrowed from Herodotus the practice of putting speeches of his own tive; but he honestly tells us, that some of these disinto the mouths of the chief personages of the narracourses are purely fictitious. Although he gives us a literal record of facts, yet he produces an effect on the without indulging in the license of invention. imagination, by skilful selection and arrangement,

His works,

The history of Herodotus abounds in marvels of this sort, and as the narrative approached the time when it was written, its interest became still more absorbing. It comprised the story of that great conflict between the Persians and the Greeks, from which Europe dates its intellectual and political supremacy, Xenophon is commonly placed in the same rank with -a story which, even at this distance of time, is the Herodotus and Thucydides. His manner and plan most marvellous and the most touching in the annals form a medium between the loose and slightly conof the human race. This portion of Grecian history nected excursions of the former, and the extreme critiabounds in all that is wild and wonderful, in all cal regularity of the latter. He resembles both in the that is pathetic and animating; in the gigantic ca- purity and sweetness of his style; he was evidently prices of infinite wealth and despotic power, and a man of elegant taste and amiable disposition, and in the mightier miracles of wisdom, virtue, and an extensive intercourse with the world. courage. Herodotus told his countrymen of rivers however, indicate no great power of mind. drank up in a day by invading hosts, of provinces famished for a meal, of passages for ships hewn through mountains, of roads for armies spread upon the waves, of monarchies and commonwealths swept away; of anxiety, and terror, and confusion and despair; of proud and stubborn hearts tried in the extremity of evil, of lives dearly sold, of signal deliverance and unsparing revenge. Whatever gave a strong air of reality to a narrative so well calculated to inflame the passions, and flatter national pride, was certain to be favorably received; and hence we easily discover the source of these characteristics in the most ancient of Greek histories, to which we have alluded.

Polybius is a historian of great fidelity. The pains. he took to inform himself on the subjects respecting which he wrote are the best guarantee for his veracity. He crossed the Alps, and traversed a great part of Gaul, to obtain correct information of Hannibal's march into Italy. Fearing that he might omit some small circumstance of Scipio's actions, he travelled over the whole of Spain, to make inquiries, and study the topography of the country. He even made use of Scipio's authority to procure vessels to sail upon the Atlantic ocean, in the prosecution of his researches. He was a Greek by birth, but he studied the Latin tongue, and gained a perfect knowledge of the Roman laws, customs and antiquities. Having obtained permission from the senate to search the capitol, he diligently examined the records, and translated such as suited his purpose into Greek.

Yet Polybius was not a man of comprehensive mind, his authorities at variance with each other, instead of nor had he the art of telling a story in an interesting carefully sifting the evidence, he either admits the difmanner. He lacks eloquence and finish of style. ficulty, and passes it over, or chooses, with little conThe distinguishing character of his history is, its di- sideration, the side that pleases him. He sometimes dactic and practical tendency. He did not design to needlessly repeats what he has said before, and in produce a work of mere amusement, but his object some cases, contradicts his own statements. was to trace events back to their causes, and deduce from them useful precepts for the benefit of the reader. He did not aim at popularity, and looked with contempt upon the refined affectation of the rhetorical writers of his day.

Sallust falls short of the majesty of Livy, but he is remarkably happy in a peculiar conciseness, clearness, and energy of expression. His great merit is impartiality, at a time when prejudice and party spirit must have been very common and very powerful in Livy stands at the head of the Latin historians. Rome. The harangues introduced into his histories His work is a magnificent monument to the glory of are extremely elaborate, but much too long for the his country, but he displays no critical regard for narratives; they have, indeed, every appearance of betruth. The painting of his narrative is unrivalled for ing purposely introduced to show the eloquence of the liveliness and grace, and nothing can be conceived writer, rather than to illustrate the subjects.

more picturesque than his descriptions. The abun

dance of interesting sentiments and splendid imagery exhibited in his pages, is almost miraculous. Grandeur, magnificence, and picturesqueness of representation, seem to have been his chief aim, next to the glory of Rome. Livy was a writer peculiarly Roman,

-the proud citizen of a commonwealth which had, indeed, lost the substance of liberty, but which still sacredly preserved its forms; in reality, the subject of an arbitrary prince, but, in his own estimation, one of the masters of the world, with a hundred kings below him, and only the gods above him.

The ancients are unanimous in giving the most ample testimony to the noble and generous impartiality of this writer, who, though he lived in the reign of Augustus, had the courage to do justice to the characters of Pompey, Cicero, Brutus, and Cassius. With a view to add to the solemnity of his history, he takes every opportunity of inserting accounts of

omens and prodigies. These are not to be considered Tacitus is regarded as the most profound of historias proofs of the writer's credulity, but as necessary ans. In the delineation of character he is unrivalled. particulars, designed to indicate the manners and We seem to know the personages described in his superstitions of the age. history as well as if we had lived with them. He Yet while we accord these merits to this great justly deserves the name of a philosophical historian. writer, we must state that his work lacks authenticity; His insight into human nature, especially into the he was more desirous to produce an imposing than an sources and workings of the bad passions, is deep accurate history, and exercised his power rather in and penetrating. He is faithful, grave, and severe. rhetorical display and in sounding the praises of Rome, The subject of his history exhibits the most shockthan in patient research after truth. He made little ing spectacle of vice to be found in the annals use of the inscriptions and public documents within of mankind; in which case, truth must necessarily his reach, and was content to follow the beaten track have all the keenness of satire. The style of Tacitus, of historians who had preceded him. When he finds however, is not only faulty in itself, but it is, in some

respects, peculiarly unfit for historical composition. to him under a thousand different aspects. By He carried his love of effect far beyond the limits of observing the manners of surrounding nations, by moderation. He tells a fine story, finely, but he can- studying their literature, by comparing it with that of not tell a plain story, plainly. His brilliant passages are far more striking when extracted from the body of the work to which they belong, than when they occur in their place and are read in connection with what precedes and follows.

CHAPTER VIII.

Of Modern History - Hume.

his own country and of the ancient republics, he is enabled to correct those errors into which the most acute men, in ancient times, have fallen by reasoning from scanty materials. Hence it is, that, in generalization, the writers of modern times have far surpassed those of antiquity.

The

Modern historians, however, have their faults. best of them have been seduced from truth, not by their imagination, but by their reason. They far excel their predecessors in the art of deducing general principles from facts; but, unhappily, they have fallen into the error of distorting facts to suit general principles. They frame a theory from looking at In the philosophy of history, the moderns have very some of the phenomena, and the remaining phenomfar surpassed the ancients. Experimental sciences ena they strain or curtail to support the theory. are generally in a state of progression, and the science In every human character and transaction there is of government being one of these, is better understood a mixture of good and evil. By a little exaggeration, at the present day than it was in ancient times. The a little suppression, a little ambiguity of style, a little art of printing, also, has not only diffused knowledge scepticism with regard to the evidence on one side, more widely, but it has introduced into reasoning a and a little credulity on the other, a totally false colorprecision and clearness unknown to the ancient com- ing may be given to a transaction, without compelling munities, in which information was, for the most part, the historian to state a literal and absolute falsehood. conveyed orally. The spirit, moreover, of the two This species of misrepresentation may be found in the great nations of antiquity was remarkably exclusive. most celebrated works of modern historians.

The Greeks and Romans admired only themselves or one another. They looked for nothing out of themselves; they borrowed nothing, they copied nothing, they translated nothing. Their literary men turned away in proud disgust from modes of thought and expression which differed from what they had been accustomed to admire. The effect was, narrowness and sameness of thought. The ancients made many just observations on man as he was found in a particular state of society, and on government as it had existed in a particular corner of the world. But of man as man, or government as government, they knew little, and speculated less. Philosophy remained stationary.

But the victory of Christianity over Paganism at length destroyed the old system of morals, and with it, much of the old system of metaphysics. It furnished the orator with new topics of declamation, the logician with new points of controversy; and it introduced new principles of action into every part of human society. The overthrow of the Roman empire produced still greater changes. The second civiliza- Hume's history of England is thought, by many tion of mankind commenced under circumstances judges, entitled to the first rank in this department of which afforded a strong security that it would never literature. The merits and demerits of the work are retrograde, and never pause. Europe became a great well known. It is written in a very easy and anifederal community. The numerous states were mated as well as thoughtful and philosophic style; united by the ties of international law and a common but it is disfigured by glaring partiality, misrepreligion. Their institutions, their languages, their resentation, and want of accuracy. The author manners, their tastes in literature, were widely differ- was too indolent to undertake the labor of research ent; but their connection was close enough to allow into original documents, and he had not sufficient of mutual observation, and to prevent, while it was knowledge of the subject to indicate the steps by not so close as to destroy, the idioms of national opinion and feeling.

which the English constitution was gradually formed. He was strongly imbued with Tory principles, and a The civilized world has thus been preserved from an dislike of the Puritans. Whenever these subjects uniformity of character fatal to all improvement. are concerned, he is not to be trusted. His whole Every part of it has been illuminated with light re- account of the reign of Charles I., and of the English flected from every other part. The number of experi- Commonwealth, is an elaborate falsification. ments in moral science which the historian has an such is the skill of his narrative, and the charm of opportunity of witnessing, has been increased beyond his style,-easy without being feeble, and simple yet all calculation. Society and human nature, instead elegant and flowing,-that Hume will always be of being seen in a single point of view, are presented popular, in spite of his known faults.

Yet