THE IDEAL HISTORY

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18653, 23 August 1930, Page 9

THE IDEAL HISTORY

LESSONS FROM PAST EXPERIENCES. “History as I learned it as school over forty years ago was barren of intellectual stimulus and civic inspiration. for it was presented as a string of more or less unrelated occurrences” (writes Dr. G. P. Gooch, in the “Contemporary Review”). “To-day, thanks to the devoted labcurs of a generation of writers and teachers, we realise that it is the record and interpretation of the life of humanity; that it is concerned with man’s ideas and ideals no less than wih his physical needs, with the pilgrimage of the spirit no less than the strength of his hands. ‘Historicus sum; nihil humani alienum puto.’ “And to-day we proceed from th« whole to the part, not from the part to the whole. Now that we know the story of mankind in all its length and breadth, it is easier to visualise and understand; for the vast structure is held together by the simple conception of growth from savagery to civilisation, and every chapter fails into its place as a stage and steppingstone in the Great Adventure. To-day is not only the child of yesterday, but the heir of all the ages.

“The awakening mind approaches the past through the medi of the imagination, not through the critical judgment or the moral sense. Every child is a partisan. His natural leaning is to the victor, the bold warrior or statesman w’ho sweeps obstacles from his path. But the child, under skilful guidance, is soon willing to look beyond mere success. It is one of the most precious services of the teacher to break the spell of the ‘great man’ by explaining that he must be judged not only by the bulk of his achievements but by the cause which he served. “There should be no difficulty,” adds Dr Gooch, in indicating the difference between Napoleon, whose insane ambition deluged Europe with blood, and Washington, who. after saving his country in the field and serving It in the council-chamber, contentedly retired to the position of a private citizen. The teacher’s task is rather to suggest tests than to impose judgments. He will have laid a solid foundation of character if he can set the childish mind on its guard against the glamour of material triumph and convince it that real greatness does not work for itself alone.

“Other types must be introduced to his attention, and fie will learn from King Alfred and Joan of Arc. St. Francis and Abraham Lincoln, Wilber - force and Shaftesbury. Livingstone and Nansen that there is no spiritual radiation without disinterested service. The youthful idealism kindled by such pillars of light may well develop into habits of thought and rules of life. “The kernel of history is the growth of civilisation. The conception of our civilisation as implying certain standards of order, liberty, justice, morality, culture, and material well-being takes shape in the mind of the young citizen and helps him to find meaning and purpose in the pageantry of events; and the conviction that it has been built up, like a coral reef, by the efforts of myriads of men and women may well inspire a determination to take his place among the architects and engineers of a better world. “Without history there can be no perspective, and without perspective there can be no insight. As its best it is a judge, wiser than any one man, without passion or fear, swayed neither by religion nor race, party nor class, a corrector of injustice, an avenger of innocence. In encourages its votaries to ask for evidence, to allow for bias, to seek and to tell the truth and nothing but the truth. “By bidding us apply not less exacting standards to the conduct of our owtci country than to that of other lands it disciplines and purifies our patriotism. In the study of history, in a word, we find precisely the synthesis of intelectual enlightenment and moral stimulus which citizenship requires and demands.”