8.5.2026 – criterion of

criterion of
history is truth; motive
in its being true

Adapted from the passage:

There is nothing that more divides civilized from semi-savage man than to be conscious of our forefathers as they really were, and bit by bit to reconstruct the mosaic of the long-forgotten past. To weigh the stars, or to make ships sail in the air or below the sea, is not a more astonishing and ennobling performance on the part of the human race in these latter days, than to know the course of events that had been long forgotten, and the true nature of men and women who were here before us.

Truth is the criterion of historical study; but its impelling motive is poetic. Its poetry consists in its being true. There we find the synthesis of the scientific and literary views of history.

In English Social History by George Macaulay Trevelyan (Longmans, Green: New York and Toronto, 1942).

To weigh the stars,

or to make ships sail in the air or below the sea,

is not a more astonishing and ennobling performance on the part of the human race in these latter days,

than to know the course of events that had been long forgotten,

and the true nature of men and women who were here before us.

As written in Wikipedia, “What is perhaps most frequently forgotten, or ignored, is the skill of his literary craftsmanship. Trevelyan was a born writer and a natural storyteller; and this, among historians, is a rare gift … If one quality is to be singled out, is should be this, for all historians he is the poet of English history.”

There will come a time when what happened to the United States in the early 21st Century.

Someone will bit by bit reconstruct the mosaic of the long-forgotten past and say, “What happened here …”

I am reminded of the story of the feller interviewing the old businessman and asking, “You worked during the three martini lunch era? What was that like?”

And the businessman replied, “I can’t remember much but I’ll tell you this, nothing happened in the afternoon!“