The present state of historical writing in America
y'^. *JB^J ■f> .r.-«- ^* .^^ ''^^„ >&■* •*bv^ 0^ o'JL"*.'*© • • • • ^> V *" .5.^ "v.. <^ IP's .^•^ ><^^ ..'". ^o^_%-rrr.- 0 cui .. <> •^^v^P-' V" c^r' -^' 'oK /%^:,. •;«^'-.''*.^^,. V 'b^ "^ ^;^'V'> -A,* . • 'o. %o' V^^ ^^•^^v ^, t^ r ••>. % •^ :% -^ <". G" V. * o » o ' .-6^ ' . . . ' V^' "''^.. '**. ■.r^r A^ v^' :a. - '^ % J ■X - »•; .^^' ^> v^^.- ■'^ .& .V 'i<- ~^^ A <■* '" =0 o > J^'-^c^ 0' » L* ' ■J^ " .V •^0 '^X .^•i^"'"^^. '^' ,*^ The Present State of Historical Writing in America BY EDWARD CHANNING Reprinted from the Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Societt FOB October, 1910 WORCESTER. MASSACHUSETTS THE DAVIS PRESS 1910 IN EXCHAN«K lit 1 B l-'l* 0 THE PRESENT STATE OF HISTORICAL WRITING IN AMERICA. BY EDWARD CHANNING. History is a mode of thought and expression. His- torical writing is the application of the historical method to expression with pen and ink. Historical labor finds its activities in many directions. It may be grouped under three heads: (1) the collecting and printing of original sources; (2) the reporting on masses of material or on specific topics; (3) historical writing. The first two of these groups represent craftsmanship; the third division represents art. It is necessary for the eluci- dation of the ages to gather documents into storehouses and to make them accessible by various modes of arrange- ment, by convenient calendars and lists of one kind or another. Some of this material is in printed books; another part is composed of original manuscripts. Between these two divisions is a series of limited dupli- cations by means of transcripts which are made by hand, or by the typewriter, or, in a more limited form, by photography. Of these the photograph is the best and, in view of the great improvements that are being made in photography, it might not be amiss to suggest that it would be well to postpone or to restrict the duphcation of manuscripts until the time comes when they can be reproduced by the camera. The task of making accessi- ble the tools of the historical writer is a necessary part of historical labor and those who engage in it deserve appreciation and recogmtion, — they are the altruists of the profession, in that they cut themselves off from the reputation-making forms of historical endeavor. The second class of historical labor presents itself to the mind under the words reports, theses, and doctoral dissertations. Hundreds and thousands of young men and old ones, as well as the middle-aged, all over the country are devoting themselves, with the greatest assiduity, to the making of extracts and abstracts of original sources, arranging them under appropriate headings, and translating them into twentieth century English, as ordinarily used in .\menca These mono- graphs, reports, and dissertations, thus laboriously com- piled, are issued in the printed form by umversities, some of which do not confine themselves to the printing of works produced within their walls, but take what they can get; others are issued by learned societies under the names of transactions, pubhcations, proceedings or collections. Given an adequate amount of material and a sufficiency of time, he must be a mediocre nian indeed or one whose brain has become mdm-ated, who cannot produce a monograph or volume, or even a series of volumes of this type. Of recent years, the output of doctoral dissertations has greatly increased, owing in part to the establishment of a large number of fellowships which are ofteiitimes designated as being for research. The ultimate aim of nearly every one of the seekers for doctorates is to engage in the teaching of history in a university, a coUege, a normal school, or perchance, in a high school The importance of providing a constant stream of youthful, weU trained pedagogues is recogmzed by aU and justifies the founding and giving of scho arships and fellowships. But we should realize that the pro- duction of pedagogues is not the same thing as the brmging forth of scholars, much less is it the making of historical writers or historians. Professor Jameson has remarked upon the barrenness of our doctors. L too as a teacher o youth, a conductor of doctoral candidates, a guider in the eWution of theses, have become conscious o the pertinacity with which writers of essays and theses in our colleges and universities, whether they get doc- torardegree! or not, stop with the work they do und direction Get them out of the umversity, get them away ?rom professorial stimulus, make them teachers make them librarians, and their original work « ops^ It is the most heart-rending thing that university teachers o history have to face at the present time. As incitements to individualistic, original research, pecumary aid has not as yet proved effective. The man who is going to be a great seeker after truth and a fruitful setter-forth of the facts of human history to his fellowmen cannot be a recluse, living on the scanty bounty of fellowships as they have been and are administered by American universities. The historical seeker and writer must have interests that will compel him to come into con- tact with other hiunan beings. The names that occur to us of great historical writers, Gibbon, Macaulay, Trevelj^au, and Lecky in England, Bancroft, Parkman, Irving, Prescott, Motley, and Palfrey in America, are not those of closeted students, living on the bounties of others. They were all active in pursuits, other than those in which they won their fame. In saying this, I am referring solely to the production of writers of history. Scholarships and fellowships have their justi- fication in producing teachers, catalogue-makers and other craftsmen; but the artist is not to be thus made. The man who has it in hun to write a great book will do it and do it better if he has to earn his own living, and is thereby forced into contact with his fellowmen, even if he half starves in the midst of his career. The qualifications of the historian are multitudinous. He must have training in research, must be able to handle material in manuscript and in printed form, and to sift the truth from the falsehood. He must have the faculty of using the work of others, of recognizing first-class monographs at a glance, almost. The ma- terials of American history are so vast that the historian, even of a fairly limited period, can hardly hope himself to read all the original sources. He must use the work of others; but he himself must also constantly be using original materials; otherwise he will lose the faculty of recognition; and he will miss that local color and flavor which make historical writing tolerable. The task of the historical writer is on all fours with that of the person who works with colors, — the historian seeks to reproduce with the pen the impression his research and reading have made on his mind, as the artist seeks 6 to reproduce mental impressions with the brush. The task of the man who endeavors to state the truth in an attractive manner in words is far more difficult than that of the novelist or the poet. For the one is hampered in every line by the necessity of speaking the truth, the other is not. The task of the historian is construc- tive, by reproduction to place in public view the record of the bygone times. With the worker in colors, the novelist, and the poet, the historian must possess imagination. He must be able to picture to himself in broad outline, the condition of a people at a given time, to see the march of armies, to recognize the inter-action of economic forces, and then to reproduce these impressions with a lightness of touch that will make them readable and with a heaviness of detail that will make them convincing. In his presentation, he must seek to produce a truthful unpression upon his reader. Oftentunes, to do this he must sacrifice absolute accuracy in detail and in per- spective. If the unpression produced upon his reader is truthful, it matters little whether all his dates are correct, all his names are properly spelled, or if all his facts are accurate. Indeed, his dates may every one of them be correct, his names may all be properly spelled, his facts may be absolutely accurate, and the impression left upon his reader be entirely false. The historian must be a person of broad sympathies; to be an antiquarian is not enough. He must have some sympathy with the ways of the economist and must regard the march of fact in the fight of the laws of human development. Professor MacMaster has rightly termed the older historians "dramatic writers." They attributed the Revolution to the Adamses, to Washing- ton, to Henry, to Otis, and to the other great men of that epoch. Approaching the problem from a more modern standpoint, it becomes increasingly evident that the separation from England was largely due to the play of economic forces. At the same time, there is no such thing as economic history; all history is economic. All historical development is founded upon industry, upon the necessity of supporting life, and the way in which it is done. It is impossible to separate economic history from political history. None the less, the his- torian owes a debt of deepest gratitude to the economist for rescuing his subject from the abyss of dramatism. The historian must also have enough of training in law to be conscious of the way in which lawyers look at affairs. He must reahze the meaning of the word, of the phrase, "the law." It is true that the historian's business and the lawyer's business are very different. The qualities of the mind that make a successful his- torian are not those that make a successful lawyer; but lack of the feeling or the knowledge of how lawyers look at certain problems is fatal to the best historical production. Similarly, he must have some acquaint- ance with that which is termed science; he must under- stand the scientific temperament; and must know some- thing of the results of scientific inquiry. The historical writer must be a master of perspective ; he must see events and men in their true relations. He must not exalt one period unduly, or give too heavy a weight to one set of events; he must not dilate too much on the influence of men and omit to set forth with equal skill the influence of underlying forces. This is not saying that an historical writer cannot treat a limited period or a limited topic or that biography may not be one form of historical writing; but within his field, the historical writer must see the perspective truly. This is one of the most difficult of all aclaievements for the historian, because in his researches, he is likely to come upon new material relating to some one part of his studies that no one else has ever seen, or rather that no one else has ever understood. The temptation is great to apportion his space according to the importance of his materials, not according to the importance of the events or the men. The difference between the tasks of those whom I have termed historical craftsmen and those whom I 8 have called historical writers lies in the amount of think- ing necessary for the best production in their respective fields. The searching for documents, the copying of them accurately, the verifying of texts, and the seeing them accurately printed is a work that demands time, labor, and patience. The writing of reports or theses likewise demands prolonged labor in searching out facts, some skill in ascertaining the truth of them, and some facihty in putting them together. The object of these productions, however, is not so much to stim- ulate and interest large numbers of readers as to pro- vide accurate and painstaking statements of fact for the use of university professors and historical writers. It is not expected of the monographer that he shall be interesting or stimulating, he can be as dry and detailed as he pleases. The object of the historian is very different and his mode of procedure must be quite unlike that of the purveyor of transcripts, the editor of original documents, or the writer of monographs. The first thing that the historian must do, after he has looked over his field carefully, from one end to the other, and acquired some knowledge of relative values and perspective, is to familiarize himself with the facts. It is not enough for him to note down this, that, or the other on paper and then from these notes make up his text. He must pass all this matter through his brain; he must make it a part of himself. To accomplish this, he must become very familiar with his facts ; he must be saturated with detail. He must be on speaking terms, so to say, with the men and women who take any leading part in his story. He must know, not merely a critical year or so, in their lives, he must be acquainted with their enviromnent, with their upbringing, with their mental and moral qualities. In treating of economic problems, he cannot array a mass of facts on paper, he must make the facts part of himself; he must ponder them carefully, day after day, month after month, possibly year after year, until their true relation and interaction come to be revealed to him. It is only after this pro- 9 longed research, this saturation of self with facts, after having gone through these long mental processes, often fraught with serious misgivings, that the historian is prepared to put pen to paper and try to reveal to others that which the past has revealed to him. In writing he seeks to tell the story in such a way that his readers will become convinced without being aware that they are being argued with. In his statements he must be careful not to arouse opposition, but to produce the efTect he desires by the employment of lights and shadows precisely as does the artist. He must weigh every sentence, nearly every word, with a view to euphony, to form, and even to grammar. In all this, he must put his own soul into his work and let it shine forth. The labor and risk involved in producing even a small piece of historical writing is very great. Sometimes, the author feels that it would be advisable to stop. It is absolutely impossible to write a definitive history. Every historian misses or has not access to many, many facts and papers. At any moment a document may come to Ught to destroy all statements as to some one fact or series of facts; the next historical writer must revise the dicta of centuries. An author is always prejudiced by his environment; he is limited by the span of hmnan existence. He must therefore apportion his time so that his chosen task stands a fair chance of accomplishment. Nor can he be blamed for closing his research and beginning the arrangement of his facts, for there is scarcely a field within the purview of the writer on American history that would not yield to research, if carried on for many, many years, or indefi- nitely. The time comes when the historian must begin to inake up his mind. In doing this it is not at all necessary that he should have read every bit of evidence. Take the countless diaries and journals of the blockade of Boston, or simply those dealing with Bunker Hill; there are differences between them, no doubt, but in essentials they teach the same truths. These will be patent to the man of historical genius when he has read 10 three or four of them, and will never become visible to him whose mind works in another way, no matter how many he may read. In looking about for writers of history in this country at the present moment, the seeker is met with greater discouragement than would befall him in almost any other path of original research. The American people are in the midst of a cycle of commercialism. There has not been a time for many years, at any rate, when scholarship has been so hghtly valued in the United States as it is at the present moment. In talking with students, in viewing the books that are printed, one is driven to this conclusion, lamentable though it is. Scholarship is momentarily at a very low ebb, because it is not valued throughout the country at large. Now- adays the size of the output and not the quality of the production is what attracts attention. The standard- ization of education, not the making of scholars, is the cry. Let anyone turn the matter over in his own mind and see if he cannot count the really first-class works of American historical writers within the last twenty- five years, on his fingers ; and yet conceive of the num- ber of persons engaged in historical pursuits and the number of books constantly published under the guise of history! Some day the wheel will turn around; scholarship will again be valued as a national asset; and a new Parkman will arise! Possibly, he may produce only one volume, but if that volume shall be of the quality of the "Pioneers of France," it will do more for the cause of educating the plain people and the building up of his own reputation than the printing of documents by the ton or the publication of mono- graphs by the dozen. .-J^" ,. 5K /% }P-r^ ^0^ • . V ^0 vt, -M" ■/ °- ' % V'^^ J"^-^ V ^ ,. 0 - . , "^o .4^ . I -. 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