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meaning and awakens a deep interest, while it tells the lessons of the Past for the warning of the Present and the edification of the Future. A nation is but a single family of the Human Race, and the Historian should remember that there is a Life of the Race, not less than of the several nations and each special man.

If the Historian takes a limited period of the life of any country for his theme, then it is a single chapter of the nation's story that he writes. He ought to show, by way of introduction, what the nation has done beforehand; its condition, material and spiritual, the state of its Foreign Relations, and at home the state of Industry, Letters, Law, Philosophy, Morals, and Religion. After showing the nation's condition at starting, he is to tell what was accomplished in the period under examination; how it was done, and with what result at home and abroad. The Philosophy of History is of more importance than the Facts of History; indeed, save to the antiquary who has a disinterested love thereof, they are of little value except as they set forth that Philosophy.

Now the subjective character of an Historian continually ap pears, colors his narrative, and affects the judgment he passes on men and things. You see the mark of the tonsure in a history written by a priest or a monk; his standing-point is commonly the belfry of his parish church. A courtier, a trifler about the court of Queen Elizabeth, has his opinion of events, of their causes and their consequences; a cool and wise politician judges in his way; and the philosopher, neither a priest, nor courtier, nor yet a politician, writing in either age, comes to conclusions different from all three. A man's philosophical, political, moral, and religious creed will appear in the history he writes. M. de Potter and Dr. Neander find very different things in the early ages of the Christian church; a Catholic and a Protestant History of Henry the Eighth would be unlike. Mr. Bancroft writes the history of America from the stand-point of Ideal Democracy, and, viewed from that point, things are not what they seem to be when looked at from any actual Aristocracy. Hume, Gibbon, Mackintosh, and Schlosser, Sismondi, Michelet, and Macaulay, all display their own character in writing their several works. Hume cannot comprehend a Puritan, nor Gibbon a "Primitive Christian; Saint Simon sees little in Fenelon but a disappointed courtier, and in William Penn Mr. Bancroft finds an ideal Democrat.

A man cannot comprehend what wholly transcends himself.

Could a Cherokee write the history of Greece? a Mexican, with the average culture of his nation, would make a sorry figure in delineating the character of New England. If the Historian be a strong man, his work reflects his own character; · if that be boldly marked, then it continually appears the one thing that is prominent throughout his work. In the Life and Letters of Cromwell we get a truer picture of the author than of the Protector. The same Figure appears in the French Revolution, and all his historical composition appears but the grand Fabling of Mr. Carlyle. But if the Historian is a weak man, a thing that may happen, more receptive than impressive, then he reflects the average character of his acquaintance, the circle of living men he moves in, or of the departed men whose books he reads. Such an Historian makes a particular country his special study, but can pass thereon with only the general judgment of his class. This is true of all similar men: the water in the pipe rises as high as in the fountain, capillary attraction aiding what friction hindered; you know beforehand what an average party-man will think of any national measure, because his "thought" does not represent any individual action of his own, but the general average of his class. So it is with an ordinary clergyman; his opinion is not individual but professional. A strong man must have his own style, his own mode of sketching the outline, filling up the details, and coloring his picture; if he have a mannerism, it must be one that is his own, growing out of himself, and not merely on him, while in all this the small man represents only the character of his class: even his style, his figures of speech, will have a family mark on them; his mannerism will not be detected at first, because it is that of all his friends. Perhaps it would make little difference whether Michael Angelo was born and bred amid the rugged Alps or in the loveliest garden of Valombrosa-his genius seeming superior to circumstances; but with an artist who has little original and creative power, local peculiarities affect his style and appear in all his works.

Now within a thousand years a great change has come over the spirit of history. The historical writings of Venerable Bede and of Louis Blanc, the Speculum Hystoriale of Vincencius Bellovacensis, so eagerly printed once and scattered all over Europe, and the work of Mr. Macaulay, bear marks of their respective ages, and are monuments which attest the progress of mankind in the historic art.

In the middle ages Chivalry prevailed: a great respect was felt for certain prescribed rules; a great veneration for certain eminent persons. Those rules were not always or necessarily rules of Nature, but only of Convention; nor were the persons always or necessarily those most meet for respect, but men accidentally eminent oftener than marked for any substantial and personal excellence. The Spirit of Chivalry appears in the writers of that time, in the Song and the Romance, in History and Annals, in Homilies, and in Prayers and Creeds. Little interest is taken in the people, only for their chiefs; little concern is felt by great men for industry, commerce, art; much for arms. Primogeniture extended from Law into Literature; History was that of Elder Brothers, and men accidentally eminent seemed to monopolize distinction in letters, and to hold possession of History by perpetual entail. History was aristocratic; Rank alone was respected, and it was thought there were but a few hundred persons in the world worth writing of, or caring for; the mass were thought only the sand on which the mighty walked, and useful only for that end; their lives were vulgar lives, their blood was puddle blood, and their deaths were vulgar deaths.

Of late years a very different spirit has appeared; slowly has it arisen, very slow, but it is real and visible, the Spirit of Humanity. This manifests itself in a respect for certain rules, but they must be Laws of Nature-rules of Justice and Truth; and in respect for all mankind. Arms yield not to the gown only, but to the frock; and the aproned smith with his creative hand beckons destructive soldiers to an humbler seat, and they begin with shame to take the lower place, not always to be allowed them. This Spirit of Humanity appears in Legislation, where we will not now follow it;-but it ap pears also in Literature. Therein Primogeniture is abolished; the entail is broken; the monopoly at an end; the Elder Sons are not neglected, but the Younger Brothers are also brought into notice. In History as in Trade, the course is open to talent. History is becoming democratic. The Life of the People is looked after; men write of the ground whereon the mighty walk. While the coins, the charters, and the capitularies which are the monuments of kings-are carefully sought after, men look also for the songs, the legends, the ballads, which are the medals of the People, stamped with their image and superscription, and in these find materials for the Biography of a nation. The manners and customs of the great mass of

men are now investigated, and civil and military transactions are thought no longer the one thing most needful to record. This spirit of Humanity constitutes the charm in the writings of Niebuhr, Schlosser, Sismondi, Michelet, Bancroft, Grote, Macaulay, the greatest historians of the age; they write in the interest of mankind. The absence of this spirit is a sad defect in the writings of Mr. Carlyle; -himself a giant, he writes History in the interest only of giants.

Since this change has taken place, a new demand is made of an Historian of our times. We have a right to insist that he shall give us the Philosophy of History, and report the lessons thereof, as well as record the facts. He must share the Spirit of Humanity which begins to pervade the age; he must not write in the interest of a class, but of mankind, in the interest of Natural Right and Justice. Sometimes, however, a man may be excused for lacking the Philosophy of History; no one could expect it of a Turk; if a Russian were to write the history of France, it would be easy to forgive him if he wrote in the interest of tyrants. But when a man of New England undertakes to write a history, there is less excuse if his book should be wanting in Philosophy and in Humanity; less merit if it abound therewith.

Mr. Prescott has selected for his theme one of the most important periods of history from the middle of the fifteenth to the middle of the sixteenth century. The three greatest events of modern times took place during that period: the Art of Printing was invented, America discovered, the Protestant Reformation was begun. It was a period of intense life and various activity, in forms not easily understood at this day. The Revival of Letters was going forward; the classic models of Greece and Rome were studied anew; the Revival, also, of Art; Lionardo da Vinci, Pietro Perugino, Michael Angelo, Raphael, were achieving their miracles of artistic skill. Science began anew; new Ideas seemed to dawn upon mankind; modern Literature received a fresh. impulse. The new Thought presently reported itself in all departments of life. Navigation was improved; commerce extended; a new world was discovered, and, baited by the hope of gold or driven by discontent and restless love of change, impelled by desire of new things or constrained by conscience, the Old World rose and poured itself on a new

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