388 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



SAVAGERY AND SURVIVALS. 



BY J. WILLIAM BLACK, Ph. D., 



ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY IN BERLIN COLLEGE. 



MR. EDWARD A. FREEMAN, the eminent English his- 

 torian, has given us a short and popular definition of his- 

 tory in the phrase, " History is past politics." While it is true 

 that history includes past politics, and that the political events of 

 to-day become the history of to-morrow, we must acknowledge 

 that the province of history is more extensive than is indicated 

 in this pithy phrase if we are ready to admit, as it seems we 

 should, that the highest end of history is ethical and social, and 

 not merely political. 



We can not say that history is limited for its materials to 

 written records ; nor do we agree with Morrison,* who says that 

 history is simply literature, and begins with the historical books 

 of the Old Testament. 



We really commence our study of history with the first traces 

 of man's presence upon this earth. His bones are to us not only 

 of physiological but of historical importance. His tools, imple- 

 ments, ornaments, and relics are historical records. 



Formerly history was altogether written on the artistic plan. 

 We find that many of the most prominent Greek and Roman 

 writers continually sacrificed the truth to literary finish. Since 

 the middle of this century our conception of history has greatly 

 changed. We regard history as a science, and employ scientific 

 methods in our treatment of historical data. Herodotus's con- 

 ception of history comes to us again in a new light " wrropia," 

 meaning a learning by investigation. 



The study of history conveys to us a knowledge of the intimate 

 connection existing between the past and the present. Much of 

 our material for historical investigation we find not in the past, 

 but in living and present things. Archaeology will demonstrate 

 this to us. Thanks to the recent discoveries and excavations of 

 the archaeologists of the Capitoline Hill, the history of Rome has 

 been entirely rewritten since the French Revolution. How much 

 'new light the study of institutions in the primitive times and 

 among the peoples of to-day, whose development has not kept 

 pace with our own, throws upon the origin of the state and of 

 many of our own social institutions ! 



History brings to us a knowledge of the past to aid us in the 

 settlement of present problems ; and so Droysen's ideal comes to 

 us as the highest and best conception of history. " History," he 



* Encyclopaedia Britannica, article History, by J. C. Morrison. 



