SCIENCE OF HISTORY. 543 



series of examples how often events on which the whole 

 destiny of subsequent civilization turned, were dependent on 

 the personal character for good or evil of some one individual. 

 It must he said, however, that Greece furnishes the most 

 extreme example of this nature to he found in history, and is 

 a very exaggerated specimen of the general tendency. It has 

 happened only that once, and will probably never happen 

 again, that the fortunes of mankind depended upon keeping a 

 certain order of things in existence in a single town, or a 

 country scarcely larger than Yorkshire; capable of being 

 ruined or saved by a hundred causes, of very slight magnitude 

 in comparison with the general tendencies of human affairs. 

 Neither ordinary accidents, nor the characters of individuals, 

 can ever again be so vitally important as they then were. 

 The longer our species lasts, and the more civilized it becomes, 

 the more, as Comte remarks, does the influence of past genera 

 tions over the present, and of mankind en masse over every 

 individual in it, predominate over other forces : and though 

 the course of affairs never ceases to be susceptible of alteration 

 both by accidents and by personal qualities, the increasing 

 preponderance of the collective agency of the species over all 

 minor causes, is constantly bringing the general evolution of 

 the race into something which deviates less from a certain and 

 preappointed track. Historical science, therefore, is always 

 becoming more possible : not solely because it is better studied, 

 but because, in every generation, it becomes better adapted 

 for study. 



