The name is absent

40 Nineteenth Century Peace Congresses
and especially in these days, when surely another peace con-
ference will be meeting, these are the questions which we
must ask of Metternich, of Talleyrand, of Napoleon, and
of Disraeli.

History is the study of some period in the life of men in
the light of some future. Every day throws all the past into
new perspective and demands a new emphasis and a new
explanation. Incidents and men which seemed insignificant
yesterday, to-day are chosen as the important realities of
their times. It is for this reason that even if no new docu-
ments are brought to light and no new episodes are discov-
ered, there must ever be a new history in every age. The
supreme function of the historian as distinguished from the
mere annalist is always selective. He does not necessarily
take his stand on the present or the imagined future and
select his past to explain that present or future, but he must
inevitably take that stand on some position beyond the one
he is describing. Otherwise there is no possibility of feeling
the sweep of events or of choosing any scheme to reduce
their multiplicity to order. And the surest and most inter-
esting standpoint for the study of any period, however
remote, is usually either the present or some period not too
distant which is still living in imagination with all the rich
connotations of reality.

No one can hope that historical work will really be final
any more than one can hope that work in any living science
will be final. To-morrow and day after to-morrow our his-
tory will inevitably be different, not only in the extent of its
content but also in its fundamental and scarcely defined point
of selection. Even the scientific German historians were
absolutely unable to tell the story of the Roman Empire or
of the Papacy without showing in every line what it was
which had significance for their own age. Complete detach-

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