What is History?

History is the study of the past. It is an umbrella term that relates to past events
as well as the memory, discovery, collection, organization, presentation, and
interpretation of information about these events. Scholars who write about
history are called historians.
History, when considered as a science, differs from the physical sciences and
mathematics. In the physical sciences, the facts exist; they are living, and they
can be re-presented to a spectator or witness.
In history, the facts no longer exist; they are dead and can neither be revived in
front of a spectator, nor confronted with a witness.
Physical sciences speak directly to the senses, while history speaks only to the
imagination and memory.
Hence, between physical facts, i.e. existing, and historical facts, i.e. narrated,
there is an important difference regarding the belief we can put in them.
Physical facts bear evidence and conviction, because they are tangible and
show up in person on the immutable scene of the universe. Historical facts, on
the contrary, because they only appear as phantoms on the irregular mirror of
the human mind where they yield to the most bizarre projections, can only
arrive at likelihood and probability.
It is thus necessary, when evaluating the degree of credibility that historical
facts have, to examine them carefully in two respects:
1 with respect to their proper essence, i.e. the degree of analogy or
incompatibility with physical facts of the same type, still in existence and
known, which constitutes possibility;
2 with respect to their narrators and witnesses, examined in their moral
faculties, in their means of instruction, information, in their impartiality, which
constitutes moral probability.
This operation is a complicated assessment having a double refraction which,
due to the mobility of objects, renders judgment very delicate and susceptible
to many errors.

A very wise oriental proverb says: Who believes a lot, mistakes a lot. If there is
a right, it is without doubt the right of not delivering the mind to whatever
repels it; it is to doubt whatever we do not understand.
Skepticism is the middle ground between the extremes of not believing
anything and believing everything. The skeptic examines, feels around an
object with defiance. Thats the doctrine of examining-doubt, which serves the
united cause of freedom and philosophy, since the special characteristic of
philosophy is to leave to each person the faculty of judging in accordance with
the measure of his feeling and conviction. We preach examining-doubt or
skepticism, because history has shown that certitude is the doctrine of error and
falsehood, and the constant weapon of tyranny.
For man, History is one of the most fecund sources of his prejudices and errors:
1. It is from History that we derive our religious opinions, and wherever
religion is false, the immense quantity of actions and judgments based on
it, are also false and crumbles with it.
2. It is again from History that we derive most of our political maxims and
principles which guide governments, topple or consolidate them.
3. Finally, it is the stories we hear every day a true branch of History
which become the more or less mediate cause of a host of erroneous ideas
and actions.
Hence, if we subject human errors to arithmetic, we may be certain that out of a
thousand errors, nine hundred and eighty belong to History. We postulate in
principle that whatever each person possesses in terms of prejudices and false
ideas comes from another person, through the credulous confidence given to
stories; while whatever the person possesses in terms of truth and precise ideas
comes from himself and his personal experience.
The mental disposition most suited for instruction, for the discovery of truth,
for the peace and happiness of individuals and nations is: Do not believe easily!
Thus, if we should recommend a precept to all teachers, to parents natural
teachers of their children it would be: Do not subordinate childrens belief to
any intimidating or magisterial authority; Do not accustom children to taking
words for truth, to believing what they do not understand.
On the contrary, the children should be shielded from this double tendency
towards credulity and certainty; a tendency that is all the more powerful
because it derives from ignorance, sloth and pride, which are natural to man.
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Finally, the system of education and instruction should not be based on the
diverse and controversial facts of an ideal world, but on the facts of the physical
world, whose knowledge, always reducible to demonstration and evidence,
offers a fixed basis to judgment and opinion, and solely deserves the name of
philosophy and science.
Almost all the writers on historical certainty wrote with partiality and
prejudice. They exaggerated this certainty and its importance, because it was on
them that most religious systems had the imprudence of founding their
questions of dogma, instead of founding them on natural facts, capable of
providing evidence.
Should history be taught in primary schools?
It is evident that primary schools, being composed of children with
undeveloped intelligence, who have no ideas, no means of assessing social
facts, are not suited for this type of knowledge. History will give them
prejudices, erroneous and false ideas, making them voluble and parrot-like.
The only type of history that is suitable for children is the biographical, or that
of the lives of men, i.e. private or public life. Experience has proved that this
type of teaching, practiced during wakes in families, produced a powerful
effect on young minds, and excited in them this desire to imitate, which is a
physical attribute of our nature, and which ultimately determines our actions.
Most often, it is the traits received during such teachings, which decided the
vocation and penchants of the childs entire life. These traits are much more
efficacious because no art was used in preparing them, and because the child,
who reflects and judges, has a greater sentiment of his freedom, by not feeling
dominated or influenced by a superior authority. Ancient Europeans knew this
when, to accredit their dogmatic opinions, they imagined this type of document
called The Lives of Saints. We are wrong to imagine that such compositions are
devoid of merit and talent; many of them were done with a lot of art, and a
great knowledge of human nature: and the proof of this lies in the fact they
frequently achieved their objective of moving minds in the intended direction.
The novel can be superior to history in usefulness. It is desirable for
government to encourage elementary books of this type; and as such books
belong less to history than to morals, it would be good to remind their
compositors of two fundamental precepts of the art, from which they should
never deviate: concision and clarity. Too many words fatigue children, render
them loquacious; concise traits strike them, render them pensive; and it is less
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the reflections made to them, than the ones they make to themselves, that
benefit them.
The issue is not to know a lot, but to know well; because half-knowledge is a
false knowledge, a hundred times worse than ignorance.
Before introducing the youth to the study of history, it would be advisable to
wait for them to have their own judgment, and are free from authoritative or
magisterial influence. Their fresh and un-ignorant minds would be better
adapted to capture new viewpoints, and not waver in the presence of
prejudices inspired by routine education.
A convenient study plan would involve the acquisition of preliminary notions
of the Exact Sciences and Astronomy, i.e. mathematics, physics, the state of the
sky and the terrestrial globe.
In other words, it would be better to have their minds furnished with the
means and terms of comparison, empowering them to assess the facts that will
be narrated to them.
We say the state of the sky and the terrestrial globe, because without some
ideas of astronomy, nothing can be conceived in geography, and without some
knowledge of geography, we would not know where to place the scenes of
history, which float in the mind like clouds in the air.
Profound knowledge of the two sciences would not be necessary, since history
would provide for any deficiencies.
They are not required to be exempt from prejudice, either in morals or in
religious ideas; it suffices that they are not obdurate about anything; that their
minds are open to observation. There is no doubt that the varied spectacle of all
the contrasts of history would redress their ideas by extending them.
We are stubborn because we know only ourselves and our folks. We are
intolerant because we have only seen our clan; because stubbornness and
intolerance are only the fruits of an ignorant egotism. When we have seen
many peoples, when we have compared many opinions, we perceive that each
person has his price, each opinion has its reasons, and we smoothen the sharp
edges of our new vanity in order to roll softly in the torrent of society.
The norm should be the adoption and inculcation of the philosophical
approach, defined as observation devoid of passion or prejudice.
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How does history influence the opinions of future generations and the
conduct of peoples and their governments?
A few examples will demonstrate the power of these types of narrative and the
manner of their presentation.
Alexander the Great was immensely influenced by Homers Iliad; and the
history of Alexander the Great, written by Quintus Curtius Rufus, a Roman
historian, became the driving force of the terrible wars, which devastated
northern Europe in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. We have read the
History of Charles XII, king of Sweden, and we know that it was from the work
of Quintus Curtius Rufus that he took this mania to imitate Alexander.
After these personal examples, lets consider some popular and national
examples.
Whoever has read history attentively would have noticed that the quotations
and applications of historical traits from Hebrew books are perpetual.
If the popes anoint and coronate kings, it is in imitation of Melchizedek and
Samuel; if emperors weep for their sins at the feet of pontiffs, it is in imitation
of David and Ezekias; it is in imitation of the Jews that Europeans wage war on
the infidels; it is in imitation of Ehud, Eglon and Judith, that individuals
murder princes and obtain the crown of martyrdom.
When in the 15th century the printing press published those books, which were
previously manuscript, and made them popular and almost classic, it was a
redoubling of influence and a kind of epidemic of imitation: we recall the fatal
effects of those books in the wars of Germany, promoted by Luther; in those of
England led by Cromwell; and in those of the Catholic League in France,
terminated by Henry IV. These effects have been powerful in the American
war; and the passages of the Bible, where Moses and Samuel expose the
excesses of the royalty, greatly helped to promote insurgency.
Thus, the motive power of the destiny of the universe, the normal rule for an
immensity of generations has been taken from the history of a small group of
people (the Jews), almost unknown in antiquity.
Assume the non-existence of these books, and all the system of Muhammad,
based (aped) on that of Moses, would not have existed: and all the movement
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of the roman world for over ten centuries, would have taken a different
direction.
Assume again that the first printing houses had, in their stead, spread good
books on morals and politics, or that those books contained such precepts, the
minds of nations and governments would have received a different impulse;
and we can say that the deficiency and vice of these books, in this regard,
constituted a cause, if not radical, at least subsidiary, of the evils that have
desolated nations.