Precisely the same process of decay is gradually removing the evidences of the historical labours of the writers of recent generations even now. The multiplication of books by the printing-press makes the process a trifle slower, perhaps; but it is no less sure. A goodly number of works that were famous half a century ago are now absolutely inaccessible to the would-be purchaser: the great book markets of Paris, Berlin, and London cannot secure or supply them. A few copies of these works are still extant in private collections and public libraries, but the fate of these is assured. Libraries are constructed to be burned. Some day a lick of flame will wipe out the last copy of any work issued only in a single edition, and the author will become thenceforth merely a name and a memory; or if, perchance, some latter-day Suidas or Stobæus has quoted a sentence from him, such sentence will be treasured in catalogues of fragments of eighteenth and nineteenth century historians. For many such an author, the present work may perform the function of Suidas or Stobæus, for a long list of these obsolescent writers will be found represented in our pages,—not always preserved for their antiquarian interest indeed, but quoted in regard to events concerning which their authority is still standard, and because it is believed that, in the cases selected, their treatment has not been excelled by any more recent performance; sometimes, on the other hand,—but more rarely,—quoted because of the quaintness of their diction, because of the archaic cast of thought through which they reflect the spirit of their times, or because of their sheer whimsicality.
But while emphasising the catholicity of taste that judges matter on its own merits, excluding nothing simply because it is old, it must be emphasised also that in the main such selection leads to the inclusion of a preponderance of recent matter. Each generation builds upon the shoulders of the last, and the work, as a whole, is progressive. So we go not merely to the latest books, but also to the recent numbers of periodicals, the publications of learned societies and the like. And to put the cap-sheaf to modernity, the greatest living experts in each field have contributed original essays and characterisations expounding the latest developments. These contributions, in which master workers summarise the results of years of investigation, will be found not the least valuable part of our work.
Most that has been said thus far has tended to emphasise the variorum or anthological features of our work. But it must be evident that there is another and quite different point of view from which our historical structure may be considered. This point of view regards our history not as a compilation—an anthology—but as an altogether new and original work. A moment’s consideration will show how fully justified we are in referring to this aspect of the subject. For it is obvious to the least attentive consideration that the intrinsic materials which make up the story of history might be never so abundant, never so valuable, without in the least presupposing that the history composed of them will be an artistic or valuable work; any more than an abundant supply of bricks, marble, and mortar necessarily determines the building of a beautiful edifice. The materials are, indeed, prerequisites; but an intelligent manipulation of the materials is at least equally essential. There must be an architect to plan the structure as a whole, and artists and artisans to select and manipulate the materials in accordance with the plan, or the result will be, not an edifice, but a brick-heap.
Since, then, we have dwelt at some length upon the fundamental materials of our historical structure, it is necessary that we should be equally explicit regarding the shaping of the architectural design—to hold to our figure—in accordance with which the materials have been first selected, and secondly amalgamated with other materials;—each stone not only selected of proper quality and size, but chiselled and polished to fit its proper niche.
The simile of an architect constructing a building, cheap and trite as it is, cannot well be dispensed with if we are to give the reader a vivid picture of our method of construction. It must be understood that whether our result be good or bad, there is nothing fortuitous, nothing haphazard about it. We did not start groping blindly for material, hoping to see an artistic structure form itself out of chaos. Our entire plan was as fully preconceived as the plan of any other architect. First, the kind of structure was determined on: in other words the scope of our subject,—world history; the entire sweep of important human events from the earliest times to the present day. Secondly, the approximate size of the projected structure was determined—its ground surface, its height, its total mass; or, speaking in the terminology of our specific structure, the number of volumes, the size of each volume, the total mass or number of pages involved.
Next the proportions of the structure, the number of floors and of rooms to each floor; the relative size and dimensions of the various departments; or, in book terms, the proportionate number of volumes or pages to be given to each important department of history: so many volumes to the Old Orient; so many to the Classical World; so many to the Middle Ages; so many to the important divisions of modern history.
All this, let it be repeated, was accurately predetermined before a single block of material was explicitly selected for the building. It does not follow that absolutely no changes have ever been made in the original plan—no architect perhaps ever made a building of which this was quite true; but it is true that the original plan was so carefully thought out, so well considered, that the changes are utterly insignificant in comparison with the unmodified portions of the structure. This point should be emphasised and clearly borne in mind, because upon it depends a large measure of our confidence that we have produced a structure not without artistic and correct proportions. It was the predetermination of the proportions, and this alone, that could control the enthusiasm of unrestrained specialism, and keep to anything like a true historical perspective. Over and over again it has been proved that the special worker, when he came to focus upon a given period, was in the position of a microscopist, viewing his wonderfully interesting microcosm. All the rest of the world shut out for the moment, the little circle of the microscopic field, which may be in reality one hundredth of an inch in diameter, looms before the view at an angle which literally makes it seem to eclipse the world itself.
And so the historical delver, when he finds himself in the midst of the literature on any period whatever—be it a mere historical mole-hill—finds himself surrounded by a heap of literary bricks which shuts out the very mountain ranges of history from his vision. At once he demands—feels that he must have—space for his magnified mole-hill; and it is only the predetermined editorial restrictions that keep him from filling entire volumes with fascinating stories about some petty kingdom which, from the world-historical standpoint, is entitled to pages only. It is a conservative estimate of the facts to assert that there is no period of our history for which ten times the amount of material has not been garnered than could possibly be used in extenso. The chart of the architect has lain always open upon the editorial desk, and rule and compass have been ever ready to restrain and check the over-enthusiasm of the worker whose zeal would otherwise lead him to present megaliths where the specification called for, and the plan permitted, only tiny bricks.
As to whether the plans of the architect were intrinsically good; whether the specification called for bricks where bricks were logically needed, and for megaliths in their proper place—these are questions that will not be entered on here. But a word may be permitted as to the ruling motives which have dominated the conception, and which, it is hoped, have never been lost sight of. These ruling motives are two: first, the hope of attaining a high standard of historical accuracy in the most critical acceptance of the term; secondly, the desire to retain as much as possible of human interest in the broadest and best sense of the words. To attain the first of these ends it is necessary to be free from prejudice, to have unflagging zeal in collecting testimony, to have scientific and critical acumen in weighing evidence; to attain the second end it is essential that kindred faculties should be applied not to the facts of history but to the literary presentations of these facts, that the good and true story may not be spoiled in the telling.