Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1889-08-23
The Choice Of Histories.
[From The Waperly Progress, by j. l..
LODGE, d. D., Editor.

Human life is too short to waste precious
time in learning amiss what must be after
ward unlearned il we would make the best
use OF faculties bestowed and opportunities
granted. Admitting that one of the best fur
nishings for usefulness in any position in life
is supplied through an understanding of
what the past has to say to US, the first neces-
sity is that OF deriving our information from
authoritive sources From the nature of the
case, youth is almost wholly dependent up
on teachers, though these latter are some
times hampered by higher authority. This
is one of the many disadvantages of the pub
lie school system. In colleges, and institu-
tons not subject to governmental control,
thoroughly competent judges, made such by
personal research and the gifts of wisdom
and graces of culture, establish a curricu-
lum which experience has proved the best.
If the ideal be reached, and the partisan
spirit cast out, no safer guide could possibly
be found; since each generation must be
pupil to its predecessor; the only question
being, who is competent to advise?
Your editor has no ambition TO be ranked
among those astute and conscientious per-
sons who review Il book and read it alter
ward and shall, therefore, venture no criti-
cism upon authors he has never studied.
Forty years mostly devoted to hard study
should have yielded some hints worthy
of attention. Experience, which is prac-
tically the best of teachers, must have
convinced the most critical of the truth of
Carlyle's remark that "History, as it stands
all bound up in gilt volumes, is but shade
more instructive than the modern volumes
OF a Backgammon beard" because it has
dealt with matters which had in them the
seeds of death, without vital or lasting in
terest to the next billow of life which should
surge within the old embankment, when its
forerunners has disappeared in eddying
foam. Reports of parliamentary debates !;
the endless repetition OF kingly name !;
how one ministry removed what another
had built up; how the wings were in and
the tories wanted to be about as interest
ing to men who pant for truth, and wish to
follow the operation of eternal principles
through successive ages, as the game OF base
ball played last week will be to men OF
brains ten years hence! History, to deserve
the name, should tell us OF the people, how
tn ey lived, what they thought, performed,
suffered Whether, in those old days, any
vampire tariff fastened itself on the body
polite, and famed its cheeks while it stole
its breath away? Whether any scoundrelly
trusts" like a canker ate out the heart OF
the poor while the rich waxed fat and i'm
pudent2 How the people managed to rid
themselves OF these brazen tyrants-whether
by hanging, drowning, or burning? These
would be interesting accounts in our day,
and might help us AT pinch.
Just because Boswel's Life Of johnson is
really history Of England for the space
covered by his life, Carlyle says of it, "This
is precisely revocation ui the cdict of
destiny; So that time shall not utterly, not
SO soon by several centuries, have dominion
over us. A little row of naptha- lamps, with
its line of naptha-light burns clear and holy
there through the dead night OF the past !;
they who are gone are still here though
hidden they are revealed, though dead they
vet speak There il shines, that mracu
lously lampit pathway, shedding its iecbler
and ieeber twilight into the boundlcss dark
oblivion" When Goldsmith compiled his
History of England he drew largely from
ltapin, Carte, Smollett and Hume; each OF
whom" he says, shave their admirers, in
proportion as the reader is studious of po-
litical antiquities, fond Of minute aneciott,
a warm partisan, or a deliberate reasoner."
The first would be useful to one who wished
to make an "Old Curiosity Shop" of his
mind the second would please one who
read history for amusement; the third would
dwarf the intellect of the reader the fourth,
who reasons constantly himself, and com
pes his reader to think, is worth perusal.
1t needs not TO be said that Hume stands
without rival as writer of English his
tory. He is II philosopher, giving not only
the facts, but the ratt0ndte oi each event,
showing how events naturally and newt
ably followed and were produced by their
several and distinct causes. This very clear
insight into the characters and motives OF the
actors sustains the interest of the narration,
and suggests parallels in other records; none
more wildly than he recalling Byron's sad
comment:
Here is the moral Of all human tales
IT'S but the same rehearsal OF the past,
First freedom and then glory-when that
fails,
Wealth, vice, corruption, barbarism at last,
| And history with ali her volume vast
Hath but one page
The arrangement of uumcs work is most
worthy OF commcniation. Every epoch not
only, but every year is marked, with mat
| tiers of Importance occurring in 1T, making
| a connected account, and yet making spe-
cial reference easy. What Hume is to the
history of England, Gibbon is TO that OF
Rome, the best edition that of Milman.
Guizut's France, Grotc's Greece, Bancroit's
United States, are acknowledged best author
tiles. Many who read history systematically
in youth, and wish to refresh their memo
ries upon distinct periods, would find in a
good encyclopedia what they need in com
pact form Indeed, such work as the Bri-
tannca is an entire library Of the most valua'
Bile sort in itself The study of history may a
first appear dry and tiresone to undsci
plined minds bu, if persevercd III Will como
to be one Of the Indispensable tonics for in
tcllects debilitated by the popular trash Of
our day. The thesis Of Sauerte!g will come
to be admitted THAT history, after all, is
the true poetry; that reality, il rightly in
terprcled, is grander than fiction; nay, tha
even in the right Interpretation of reality
and history does genuine poetry consist