ve to discover the group
in which he took most interest, and for which he worked.

(2) The author was placed in a situation which compelled him to violate
truth. This happens whenever he has to draw up a document in conformity
with rule or custom, while the actual circumstances are in some point or
other in conflict with rule or custom; he is then obliged to state that
the conditions were normal, and thus make a false declaration in respect
of all the irregularities. In nearly every report of proceedings there
is some slight deviation from truth as to the day, the hour, the place,
the number or the names of those present. Most of us have observed, if
not taken part in, some of these petty fictions. But we are too apt to
forget them when we come to criticise documents relating to the past.
The _authentic_ character of the documents contributes to the illusion;
we instinctively make _authentic_ a synonym of _sincere_. The rigid
rules which govern the composition of every authentic document seem to
guarantee sincerity; they are, on the contrary, an incentive to falsify,
not the main facts, but the accessory circumstances. From the fact of a
person having signed a report we may infer that he agreed to it, but not
that he was actually present at the time when the report mentions him as
having been present.

(3) The author viewed with sympathy or antipathy a group of men (nation,
party, denomination, province, city, family), or an assemblage of
doctrines or institutions (religion, school of philosophy, political
theory), and was led to distort facts in such a manner as to represent
his friends in a favourable and his opponents in an unfavourable light.
These are instances of a general bias which affects all the statements
of an author, and they are so obvious that the ancients perceived them
and gave them names (_studium_ and _odium_); from ancient times it has
been a literary commonplace for historians to protest that they have
steered clear of both.

(4) The author was induced by private or collective vanity to violate
truth for the purpose of exalting himself or his group. He made such
statements as he thought likely to give the reader the impression that
he and his possessed qualities deserving of esteem. We have therefore to
inquire whether a given statement may not be influenced by vanity. But
we must take care not to represent the author's vanity to ourselves as
being exactly like our own vanity or that of our contem