182 ROBINSON— THE NEW HISTORY. [April 22, 



111 addition to the supposed uses of history mentioned by BoHng- 

 broke there was the possibihty of tracing the ways of God to man. 

 Augustine had furnished the first great example of this type of nar- 

 rative in his " City of God " and thereafter history had very com- 

 monly been summoned to the support of Christian theology. Bos- 

 suet, writing for the Dauphin in the latter part of the seventeenth 

 century, says : " Mais souvenez-vous, Monseigneur, que ce long en- 

 chainement des causes particulieres qui font et defont les empires 

 depend des ordres secrets de la Providence. Dieu tient du plus haut 

 des cieux les renes de tons les royaumes ; il a tous les coeurs en sa 

 main ; tantot il retient les passions, tantot il leur lache la bride, et 

 par la il remue tout le genre humain. Veut-il faire des conque- 

 rants ; il fait marcher I'epouvante devant eux, et il inspire a eux et 

 a leurs soldats une hardiesse invincible. Veut-il faire des legisla- 

 teurs ; il leur envoie son esprit de sagesse et de prevoyance ; il leur 

 fait prevenir les maux qui menacent les etats, et poser les fonde- 

 ments de la tranquillite publique. II connoit la sagesse humaine, 

 toujours courte par quelque endroit; il Teclaire, il etend ses vues, et 

 puis I'abandonne a ses ignorances ; il I'aveugle, il la precipite, il la 

 confond par elle-meme ; elle s'enveloppe, elle s'embarrasse dans ses 

 propres subtilites, et ses precautions lui sont un piege. Dieu exerce 

 par ce moyen ses redoutables jugements, selon les regies de sa justice 

 toujours infallible."- It was assumed by such writers as Bossuet 

 that in spite of the confessedly secret and mysterious character of 

 God's dispensations it was nevertheless quite possible for the skilled 

 theologian to trace them with edifying confidence and interpret them 

 as divine sanctions and disapprovals, blessings and punishments, 

 trials and encouragements. For various reasons, which it is unnec- 

 essary to review here, this particular method of dealing with the past 

 and deriving useful lessons from it finds few educated defenders at 

 the present day. 



In the eighteenth century a considerable number of " philosophies 

 of history " appeared and enjoyed great popularity. They were the 

 outcome of a desire to seize and explain the general trend of man's 

 past. Of course this had been the purpose of Augustine and Bossuet 



-"Discours siir I'histoire universelle," concluding chapter. 



