LXX THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



aristocrats; nor has Walter Scott, in times much nearer our own, wholly 

 escaped the same condemnation. History tells of valiant opposition in 

 times past to misgovernment and tyranny; but the opposers were in 

 most cases aristocrats themselves — the barons who brought king John 

 to terms, the Falklands and Sidneys and Hampdens who withstood the 

 exactions of Charles I, not to speak of the Gracchi who championed the 

 rights of the Roman plebs. It cannot be said, however, that its presen- 

 tation of strong personalities renders history unsuitable to engage the 

 attention of the young, for the contrary is the case; it is only as it deals 

 with striking characters and stirring events that it can interest the young 

 at all. At the same time, if its general tendency is unfavourable to 

 democratic ideas, one can understand a certain instinctive, if not con- 

 scious, objection, or at least indifference, to it in communities like our 

 own, in which the profession of such ideas is de rigueur. 



As regards school text-books a difficulty presents itself in the fact 

 that they are condemned beforehand to be written in a tone of dreary 

 and passionless neutrality, whenever questions are touched upon in 

 regard to which public opinion is divided, and with excessive glorifica- 

 tion of men who have played a prominent part in the country. In 

 works of this class it is not the good that such men have done that is 

 interred with their bones, but on the contrary whatever in their several 

 records might dim their lustre, or offend their partizans of a later day. 

 This applies particularly to countries whose history does not run back 

 very far. When a country reaches a certain age it can afford to have 

 a few scoundrels in the background. But, even in older countries, 

 the weakness referred to is exemplified. ''Many text-books," says 

 Herr Jàger, speaking of the Prussian system of education, "have 

 found it possible to assure our youths that Frederick the Great 

 was really a sound Christian. I do not know (he adds) whether it is 

 quite true that our nation is free from national pride, but I do know that 

 a healthy nation or an intelligent man must be able to endure the truth." 

 But again, what is truth? Where public opinion is divided, or where, 

 strictly speaking, there is no public opinion worth mentioning, but only 

 conflicting party opinions, what is the man to do who must perforce, 

 avoid offending either side? Doleful complaints have been made by 

 persons who have written school histories with the best intentions in 

 the world, of the ruthless way in which higher authorities have insisted 

 on rectifying the very slightest divergence from the strict median line. 

 Has our Canadian Professor fully considered all these things? 



It would be a mistake to suppose that the world had to wait till 

 the nineteenth century for any recognition of the true principles of his- 

 torical composition. Changes of intellectual habit do not come in like 

 a Noachian deluge. It would not be far wrong to say that almost every 



