130 MEDIEVAL HISTORY 



almost the artificial conditions of a laboratory experiment, medieval 

 history, and especially the first half of it, must remain the best of all 

 fields for training in scientific investigation and the discipline of the 

 critical faculty. But while we may insist, with a degree of justice 

 that is likely to be recognized by instructors in other fields of history, 

 that the future historical scholar in whatever line of research should 

 receive a part of his training in true seminary courses in medieval 

 history, that is quite different from endeavoring to direct the life- 

 work of the student into the earlier half of that period. Should it 

 not rather be our endeavor to detect among those who come under 

 our training the few from whom constructive work of a high order of 

 ability may be expected, and by such means as we can use and with 

 a view to actual attempts at such a history of this age, to assist in 

 their growth in the comprehensive grasp of a whole era and in the 

 power to judge truly the relative value of facts which are chief 

 among the qualities demanded in final historical work? 



Will you allow me to break the direct thread of my discourse at 

 this point to say that to the instructor in medieval history at least 

 the future of the historical seminary presents in my opinion a practical 

 problem of some seriousness. The prevailing, I may almost say the 

 fashionable method of conducting seminary work at present is the 

 essay method the preparation by the members of the seminary of 

 set essays or reports on assigned topics. The essay method is the 

 best, perhaps the only method of teaching constructive work, and 

 for this purpose it should be employed. Its defects are the great 

 difficulty of combining with it instruction in the details of historical 

 method and the discipline of the critical faculty, demanding for these 

 results qualities in the instructor which are not common, and qualities 

 in the student which are still more rare, at least in America. Its 

 great danger consists in the fact that it is the easiest of all methods 

 with which to get an appearance of success, so that both instructor 

 and student may plausibly delude themselves with the belief that 

 they are doing the real work for which the seminary was intended 

 when they are merely devoting themselves to what should be the 

 finishing touches, leaving the fundamental work undone. I mention 

 this briefly and only in passing, but I believe there is here a practical 

 problem that demands the careful consideration of the university 

 teacher of medieval history. 



When we turn from the first to the second half of the Middle Ages we 

 are confronted by an entirely different situation. For one thing, in the 

 past, the large majority of the ablest men who have devoted them- 

 selves to the study of medieval history have found the first half of 

 the period, for reasons perhaps not difficult to see, far more attractive 

 than the second, and have not hesitated to yield to this attraction. 

 While this is perhaps less true of English scholars than of those of 



