500 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



of the Roman procurator, must always raise regret in the mind of the 

 reader and writer of history. For we are told often and conclusively 

 that history has truth for its subject-matter and the discovery of truth 

 for its end. An authoritative definition of truth, therefore, would 

 have been a priceless boon. It has indeed been often asserted that 

 the question of Pilate was interrogative in form only, and that his 

 real thought was to affirm the hopelessness of ever reaching a defini- 

 tion. If such was the case, one might reasonably conjecture that the 

 Roman had lately been engaged in historical research ; for in no other 

 occupation is there more powerful stimulus to the despair that his 

 remark expresses." (American Historical Review, January, 1914, 

 p. 217). 



(2) "That the critical spirit in the study of history during the 

 nineteenth century has produced some astonishing results, is beyond 

 all controversy. Its reconstructions of human life in the past have 

 been no less significant than the amazing changes wrought by the 

 physical sciences in our ideas of the material universe. No wonder 

 that the mantle of scepticism has enveloped the whole historical gild, 

 so that only the hardiest of the fraternity dares venture a common- 

 place without the original source as a foot-note to sustain him." 

 (Ibid., p. 226). 



(3) "The search for original material has occupied the first 

 place in the attention of historical students (during the last two gen- 

 erations) and has proved beneficent in two ways at least: it has enor- 

 mously increased the mass of such material for the use of the man 

 competent to make a synthesis from it, and it has furnished an all- 

 engrossing occupation for many who might otherwise have tried 

 their hands, and the patience of their readers, in the hopeless task 

 of synthesizing. The high ratio of monographic collections of material 

 to organized and literary narrative is one of the most familiar char- 

 acteristics of recent publications in history." (Ibid., p. 219). 



Bernheim (p. 237) dates the real beginning of history as a science 

 in the modern sense ( = the prevailing method) at the appearance of 

 Ranke's History of the Latin and German Nations in 1824. On this 

 basis the sweeping victory of scepticism recorded in the first two of 

 the above statements by Professor Dunning has followed upon nearly 

 a century's trial of the present method in general, and a twenty-four 

 years' test of its virtues as expounded by Bernheim in particular. 



Summarized, therefore, the acknowledged situation as to the 

 1st or general requirement of history, in common with all other sciences, 

 that it dare not stop at, or sink into, scepticism and uncertainty, but 

 must supply assured knowledge, is as follows: — 



