Critical and Historical Essays, Vol. 1 of 2 (Classic Reprint)

To make the past present, to bring the distant near, to place us in the society Of a great man or on the eminence which overlooks the field of a mighty battle, to invest with the reality Of human flesh and blood beings whom we are too much inclined to consider as personified qualities in an allegory, to call up our ancestors before us with all their peculiarities of language, manners, and garb, to show us over their houses, to seat us at their tables, to rummage their Old-fashioned ward robes, to explain the uses Of their ponderous furniture, these parts Of the duty which properly belongs to the historian have been appropriated by the historical novelist On the other hand, to extract the philosophy of history, to direct our judgment of events and men, to trace the connection Of causes and effects, and to draw from the occurrences of former times general lessons of moral and political wisdom, has become the business of a distinct class of writers.

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