DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9184#0042
22
New Chapters in Greek History.
[Chap. I.
vivified by the imagination. The sight of a battle exercises
a very different power on feeling and fancy, from the mere
reading about one in a newspaper; and if the newspaper
account be read on the battle-field itself, the imagination
will be greatly stimulated. Still greater will be the
stimulus if dismounted cannon, scattered arms, and a
ground ploughed by cannon balls add reality to the scene.
In the same way Hiero of Syracuse becomes a far more
real person to us as we look at the helmet which he dedi-
cated at Olympia after his victory over the Etruscans at
Cumae. And the historical reality of the victory of
Plataea impresses itself more fully on us as we read on the
bronze serpent of Constantinople the names of the Greek
states which had a part in it. If the eye can see and the
hand touch the results of the deeds of the ancients, we
shall believe in them as we should never believe in them
from merely reading our Herodotus and Thucydides.
They come out of cloudland and become dwellers on our
earth, men of like passions with ourselves, with human
feelings and desires.
The verification of history, of which I have hitherto
spoken, must be the work of scholars and specialists. But
the vivification of ancient history, of which I am now
speaking, belongs as much or more to the ordinary student.
We must now briefly consider history not as a great
branch of knowledge, but as a means of education.
The aspects in which history may be regarded are as
many as the tendencies and prepossessions in the mind of
man. One historian cares only to trace in the past the
workings of political tendencies and forces; another is
absorbed in following the succession of phases and modes
of civilisation ; another regards historical records as the
chronicles of the struggles of races and national tempera-
ments ; another sees in the annals of nations nothing but a
series of biographies of great men. Yet perchance all
New Chapters in Greek History.
[Chap. I.
vivified by the imagination. The sight of a battle exercises
a very different power on feeling and fancy, from the mere
reading about one in a newspaper; and if the newspaper
account be read on the battle-field itself, the imagination
will be greatly stimulated. Still greater will be the
stimulus if dismounted cannon, scattered arms, and a
ground ploughed by cannon balls add reality to the scene.
In the same way Hiero of Syracuse becomes a far more
real person to us as we look at the helmet which he dedi-
cated at Olympia after his victory over the Etruscans at
Cumae. And the historical reality of the victory of
Plataea impresses itself more fully on us as we read on the
bronze serpent of Constantinople the names of the Greek
states which had a part in it. If the eye can see and the
hand touch the results of the deeds of the ancients, we
shall believe in them as we should never believe in them
from merely reading our Herodotus and Thucydides.
They come out of cloudland and become dwellers on our
earth, men of like passions with ourselves, with human
feelings and desires.
The verification of history, of which I have hitherto
spoken, must be the work of scholars and specialists. But
the vivification of ancient history, of which I am now
speaking, belongs as much or more to the ordinary student.
We must now briefly consider history not as a great
branch of knowledge, but as a means of education.
The aspects in which history may be regarded are as
many as the tendencies and prepossessions in the mind of
man. One historian cares only to trace in the past the
workings of political tendencies and forces; another is
absorbed in following the succession of phases and modes
of civilisation ; another regards historical records as the
chronicles of the struggles of races and national tempera-
ments ; another sees in the annals of nations nothing but a
series of biographies of great men. Yet perchance all