etails so as to produce this false
impression. Subsequent generations were oftener deceived themselves
than deceiving. They were sure that the Church was opposed to
education and to science, and consequently it was not hard for them to
read in certain incidents and documents a meaning quite other than
their actual significance, because this added meaning agreed with
their prejudices on these subjects.

Every advance in modern history, every modification of view that has
been brought about by the critical historical method of recent times,
has emphasized this point of view almost without exception. The
distinguished philosophic and historical writer, the Comte de Maistre,
in his Soirees of St. Petersburg about a century ago, declared that
"History for the last three centuries (1500-1800) has been a
conspiracy against the truth." Just about a century later the editors
of the Cambridge Modern History, in the preface to the first volume of
their monumental work, re-echoed the words of the Comte de Maistre
almost literally in a pregnant paragraph which deserves to be in the
note-book of everyone who is trying to get at the real truth of
history. They said:

{25}

"Great additions have of late been made to our knowledge of the
past; _the long conspiracy against the revelation of truth has
gradually given way,_ and competing historians all over the
civilized world have been zealous to take advantage of the change.
The printing of archives has kept pace with the admission of
enquirers; and the total mass of new matter, which the last
half-century has accumulated, amounts to many thousands of volumes.
In view of changes and of gains such as these, it has become
impossible for the historical writer of the present age to trust
without reserve even to the most respected secondary authorities.
The honest student finds himself continually deserted, retarded,
_misled by the classics of historical literature_, and has to hew
his own way through multitudinous transactions, periodicals and
official publications in order to reach the truth.

"Ultimate history cannot be obtained in this generation; _but, so
far as documentary evidence is at command, conventional history can
be discarded, and the point can be shown that has been reached on
the road from one to the other._"

The italics in this passage are ours, but the ideas they emphasize
will serve to show how necessary it is for most of us to gi