DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9184#0287
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CHAPTER IX.
olympia and the festival.
In order that the study of history may duly fulfil its
mission in enlarging the ideas and widening the charity
of mankind, it is essential that both the writers and the
readers of historical works should use the imagination
not less than the intellect and the memory. It is not
enough to study the chronicles of past days ; what we
want is to re-live the life of past days ; to sympathize
with the hopes and fears, to share the beliefs and the
sentiments, of the age and the country which we make
our study; to image to ourselves its daily life ; to fall
into its ways of thinking.
The historical training of the imagination is a long
and laborious task. Nor can it ever be completed by
the study of documents and of literature; though these,
of course, have their place in the curriculum. But it is
also necessary that the imagination should be approached
through the senses. We must not only read, but feel
and see. Thus, there are only two methods by which
it is possible adequately to carry the imagination through
past episodes of history. One is to study in museums
the material relics—the corpses, so to speak—left by
those episodes ; the other is to visit their graves—the
scenes where those episodes took place—and there follow
with patience and reverence their details.
CHAPTER IX.
olympia and the festival.
In order that the study of history may duly fulfil its
mission in enlarging the ideas and widening the charity
of mankind, it is essential that both the writers and the
readers of historical works should use the imagination
not less than the intellect and the memory. It is not
enough to study the chronicles of past days ; what we
want is to re-live the life of past days ; to sympathize
with the hopes and fears, to share the beliefs and the
sentiments, of the age and the country which we make
our study; to image to ourselves its daily life ; to fall
into its ways of thinking.
The historical training of the imagination is a long
and laborious task. Nor can it ever be completed by
the study of documents and of literature; though these,
of course, have their place in the curriculum. But it is
also necessary that the imagination should be approached
through the senses. We must not only read, but feel
and see. Thus, there are only two methods by which
it is possible adequately to carry the imagination through
past episodes of history. One is to study in museums
the material relics—the corpses, so to speak—left by
those episodes ; the other is to visit their graves—the
scenes where those episodes took place—and there follow
with patience and reverence their details.