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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



physics, are certain to be deeply interested 

 in its logical developments. It is a timely 

 and telling contribution to the philosophy 

 of science, imperatively called for by the 

 present exigencies in the progress of knowl- 

 edge. It is to be commended equally for 

 the solid value of its contents and the schol- 

 arly finish of its execution. 



The French Revolution. By Hippolyte 

 Adolphe Taixe, D. C. L., Oxon. Trans- 

 lated by John Durand. Vols. I, II. 

 New York: Henry Holt & Co. 1878, 

 1881. 8vo. $2.50 per vol. 



Of the three volumes which are to com- 

 plete M. Taine's " French Revolution " two 

 are now published, continuing the study 

 which was begun in his preceding work on 

 "The Ancient Regime." The two works 

 form parts of a continuous series, which 

 the author calls " The Origins of Contempo- 

 rary France." Of this extensive subject 

 M. Taine says that he has limited his treat- 

 ment, primarily, to the consideration of its 

 governmental aspects. In the work he tells 

 us : " There will be found only the history 

 of public powers. Other historians will 

 write that of diplomacy, of war, of the 

 finances, of the Church ; my subject is a 

 limited out'." 



What are the themes of the two volumes 

 before us ? Briefly : the first shows how 

 " popular insurrections and the laws of the 

 Constituent Assembly end in destroying all 

 government in France " ; the second, how 

 " a party arises around an extreme doctrine, 

 gets possession of the power, and exercises 

 it in conformity with that doctrine." That 

 doctrine was found in the generalizations 

 of Jean Jacques Rousseau. The philoso- 

 pher who generalizes must forget a great 

 many facts. In a vein of delicate irony M. 

 Taine says of his countrymen : " Almost all 

 of them, more fortunate than myself, have 

 political principles which serve them in 

 forming their judgments of the past I had 

 none ; if, indeed, I had any motive in un- 

 dertaking this work, it was to seek for 

 political principles. Thus far I have at- 

 tained to scarcely more than one, and this 

 so simple that it will seem puerile. It con- 

 sista wholly in this observation: that hu- 

 man society, especially a modern society, is 

 a vast ami complicated thing." 



In this order of M. Taine's method ; in 

 this limitation to a definite aspect of the 

 phenomena presented ; in this avoidance of 

 stock conceptions ; and in this perception 

 of the infinite differentiation of the phe- 

 nomena we may already perceive that we 

 have come upon something quite different, 

 in the way of written history, from any- 

 thing that the merely literary method ever 

 presented. M. Taine has spared no trouble 

 to get his facts at first hand. " The most 

 trustworthy testimony is that of the eye- 

 witness, especially when this witness is an 

 honorable, attentive, and intelligent man, 

 writing on the spot at the moment and un- 

 der the dictation of the facts themselves 

 if it be manifest that his sole object is to 

 preserve or furnish information." In the 

 national archives M. Taine has had access 

 to a great amount of manuscript testimony 

 of this sort. On the other hand, the Jaco- 

 bin documents, infinite in quantity, the vast 

 masses of " polemics planned for the needs 

 of a cause," of "eloquence arranged for 

 popular effect," are worthless, except as 

 they show the character of their sources ; 

 and yet they must be examined. " Never 

 has so much been said to so little purpose. 

 The historian may read kilometres of it, but 

 he rarely finds one fact, one detail of inter- 

 est, one document which calls up in his 

 mind a physiognomy, the actual sentiments 

 of either villager or gentleman, a graphic 

 picture of the interior of an hotel-de-ville 

 or a barrack, of a municipal council-cham- 

 ber, or of the character of an insurrection." 



How has M. Taine applied his methods 

 to the facts thus garnered ? In the first 

 place, he has grouped the events of which 

 he treats according to their causal relations, 

 and often, therefore, in anything but the 

 close sequence of dates. Nothing has puz- 

 zled his critics so much as this feature of 

 his treatment: his book has been much the 

 worst stumbling-block in the path of the 

 routine reviewers, American and English, 

 that has fallen in their way for years. M. 

 Taine is not now writing a school-book, with 

 a new date for each new paragraph : he is 

 writing for readers to whom a formal knowl- 

 edge, at least, of the most important crises 

 in modern history is a matter of course. 

 To recite dates in sequence is, indeed, not 

 only the schoolmaster's idea of history : it 



