[bowman] fundamental PROCESSES IN HISTORICAL SCIENCE 573 



CONCLUSION: 



THE CARDINAL FEATURES IN A SCIENTIFIC TREATMENT OF 

 RECORDS, AND THE ERRONEOUS ATTITUDE OF THE PRESENT 

 METHOD TOWARD RECORDS AS SUCH. 



(a). Scientific Treatment of Records. 



A proper, and practical, and the severest, and best, test to which 

 an historical method can be put, is when an historical student presents 

 himself, record in hand, and asks, "Now, what am I to do with it?" 

 If, in reply, such a work as Bernheim's be given him, with the direction, 

 "Search and see," the present author believes himself well within the 

 mark in saying that patient and diligent study of its 852 pages would 

 only drive the student, however capable and intelligent, deeper and 

 deeper into confusion, doubt, uncertainty and scepticism. The work 

 opens with 178 pages on the "conception and nature" (Begriff and 

 Wesen) of historical science, and it has 215 pages on "perception" 

 (Auffassung) of the connection between historical facts; but the present 

 author cannot find even an allusion to so elemental a point as the 

 custody of a record. 



The present author submits that, in answer to the above question, 

 the following are the 5 principal points to be considered by the student 

 in dealing scientifically with his record: — 



I. Was the record (or, if a copy, was the original record) when 

 first discovered, i.e., when we first have knowledge of its existence, 

 in proper custody ? 



A record is in proper custody if it be found in a place where it 

 might naturally be. Thus a manuscript discovered in a monastery in 

 northern Germany, and first printed at Rome in 1515, has formed the 

 sole basis of all subsequent editions of Books I, II, III, IV, VI, and a 

 fragment of Book V, of Tacitus' Annals. Italy and Rome would 

 have been the most natural places to find such a MS., yet it was found 

 in proper custody, because a monastery in northern Germany was also 

 a place where it might naturally be. An instance at the other end of 

 the scale is that of a letter blown into a neighbour's yard. The most 

 natural place for the letter is in its owner's pocket or desk; and yet, 

 if found in a neighbour's yard (or in practically no custody at all), 

 the letter, historically speaking, was in proper custody, because that 

 was also a place where it might naturally be. A conspicuous instance 

 of improper custody was that of the so-called Book of Mormon, which 

 Joseph Smith professed to have found in September, 1827, in a hill- 

 side in western New York. This is not a place where such a record 

 would naturally be. 



