566 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



a gathering of 40 men of more than average intelligence, out of their 

 reports, immediately written, only 1 had omissions calculated as less 

 than 20 per cent, of the characteristic acts; 14 had omitted 20 to 40 

 per cent.; 12 omitted 40 to 50 per cent.; and 13 still more than 50 

 per cent. Only 6 of the 40 made no positively wrong statements; 

 in 24, up to 10 per cent, of the statements were free inventions; and 

 in 10, or one-fourth of the papers, more than 10 per cent, of the state- 

 ments were altogether wrong. Similar tests systematically made else- 

 where show the same results. In these tests, all the reporters are 

 contemporaries. Only a few are trustworthy. Contemporaneous- 

 ness, therefore, cannot be the essence and scientific ( = necessary) 

 cause of trustworthiness. This essence and scientific cause must 

 be the qualities that, present in the few, necessarily made them essen- 

 tially trustworthy and, wanting in the many, necessarily left them 

 untrustworthy; and whoever traces out, and depends on, these quali- 

 ties in men and in their records must .himself necessarily produce a 

 record with like qualities, whether contemporaneous or not. Contem- 

 poraneousness is one of a number of opportunities to produce a valu- 

 able record, just as a lot of trees is one of a number of opportunities 

 to produce a lot of workmanlike tables. But the contemporaneous- 

 ness in itself does not prove that a valuable record will be produced, 

 any more than a lot of trees proves that there is an artificer about, 

 who will convert them into a lot of workmanlike tables. On the 

 other hand, a lot of workmanlike tables, actually produced, proves 

 that there must have a competent artificer, though anonymous and 

 unknown, with all the necessary opportunities, including the timber, 

 whether as trees, or logs, or rough or dressed lumber; and so, in the 

 parallel case, a valuable record, actually produced and exemplifying 

 the qualities or requisites of trustworthiness, proves that there must 

 have been a competent historian, though anonymous and unknown, 

 with all the necessary opportunities, if not of contemporaneousness, 

 then of trustworthy media (men or previous records) exemplifying 

 the qualities which he evidently realized were requisite for trustworthi- 

 ness, whether in himself, or in other men, or in their records. In 

 both cases, the actual product is the first, and last, and only decisive, 

 test. 



Another feature that induces the present use of contemporane- 

 ousness as a test of trustworthiness, is the fact that contemporary 

 records, whether trustworthy or not, reveal the mental and social 

 characteristics of their age with a life and reality that no later narrative 

 can reproduce. One may accurately describe a railway locomotive 

 and its performances ; or one may give the characteristic features of a 

 face so well that a detective, by the mere description, may discover 



