HISTORICAL SYNTHESIS 157 



clergymen of the Church of England, since they have exercised the 

 right of adding notes to Niebuhr's text whenever they thought they 

 had anything worth hearing to offer, might as well have remarked, 

 for the benefit of their young academical readers, on some of the 

 most offensive paragraphs which have appeared since the days of the 

 Philosophical Dictionary. But Niebuhr is, what Mr. Wordsworth 

 should not have called Voltaire, 'a pert, dull scoffer.' " 1 



Refreshing our memories by an appeal to these and kindred 

 passages, we can sympathize with the pioneers who strove for 

 enlightenment in a time when criticism was equivalent to heresy. 

 That date, however, is long past, and at present itmay not be unwise 

 to consider whether the full triumph of critical and comparative 

 methods does not in its turn disclose fresh questions to be faced 

 or rather old questions to be faced in the light of new conditions. 

 The controlling purpose, one may contend, under which data should 

 be chosen, combined, and presented, is no less a factor now than it 

 was in those long ages before the net of criticism had swept in every- 

 thing from Ranafer and Khafra to the Legend of Marcus Whitman 

 and the Literary Industries of H. H. Bancroft. More than two 

 generations have elapsed since Ranke began his career with the 

 History of the Romance and German Races ; the Ecole des Chartes 

 has been publishing its journal ever since 1839; it was in 1863 that 

 Droysen opened the ninth volume of the Historische Zeitschrift with 

 his paper on the "Elevation of History to the Rank of a Science"; 

 and for those who cannot spend their youth in a seminary, the 

 manual of Bernheim or that of Langlois and Seignobos will furnish 

 instruction regarding the rules of the game as it is currently played. 

 The fruits of critical research are untold, or at least one could not 

 attempt to tell them, without lapsing into rhetoric. Yet criticism is 

 not everything here below, and utilitarian instinct at its strongest 

 urges the historian to do something with his facts after he has got 

 them. 



In taking an abstract term like synthesis for the central point of 

 one's discourse, there is every opportunity to wander round in a fog 

 of words, losing one's self and being lost sight of by one's hearers. 

 From a desire to keep closely in touch with the concrete, I shall avoid 

 the use of metaphysical language and limit myself to a few remarks 

 upon the nceud vital of historical composition, namely, the person- 

 ality of the writer. And here what I mean to convey can best be 

 expressed through that familiar story of the artist's reply to a vacant 

 questioner. " Could you tell me, Mr. Opie, how you mix your colors? " 

 " With brains, Sir/' is the universal formula of retort to such queries, 

 whenever and wherever they may be asked. Sir James Mackintosh 

 said of Opie, that " had he turned his mind to the study of philosophy 

 1 Quarterly Review, vol. xxxix, pp. 8-9 (footnote). 



