. HUMANISM AND HISTORIOGRAPHY 1. The Renaissance and Humanism.— Re cent research and a more critical examination of the intellectual currents of European his tory have profoundly modified the exaggerated opinions of Burckhardt and Symonds with re gard to the relation of the so-called °Renais sance* to the development of European thought. It has been shown that, at the best, this period did not mark a direct and conscious advance toward modern concepts, but was distinctly the revival of interest in an antique culture, which was in many fundamental ways opposed to the' present-day outlook. This revival in directly contributed toward the development of modern thought chiefly through its aid in breaking up the ecclesiastical °fixation* of mediaeval thought and by bringing to the front again an interest in secular matters. In its broadest sense the literary phase of this move ment is now conventionally designated as °Humanism,* meaning by this not only a re vival of interest in classical literature, but also a renewal of appreciation for the broadly human interests and outlook of pagan culture. It was primarily an emotional and intellectual reaction against the narrow and ascetic atti tude of the theologians without constituting any real or conscious revolution in theology.
2. Characteristics of the Historiography of Humanism.— Though there were great dif ferences in the quality of the product of the historians of this period, as, for instance, be tween the works of a Poggio and a Guicciardini, certain fundamental characteristics of the his toriography of humanism were sufficiently general and universal to justify enumeration. The reaction of humanism upon historical writ ing was strictly in accordance with the funda mental aspects of the movement. It meant, in the first place, a search for classical texts and the comparison, criticism and improvement of those recovered. Again, it greatly reduced the element of the miraculous in historical interpre tation and lessened the °emotional thrill* of the °Christian Epic.* Pagan history was to• some extent restored to the position from which it had been excluded by the Christian writers in general, and by Augustine and Orosius in particular. This was due in part to the ad miration of the humanists for classical culture, and in part to the fact, that, for the first tune since the passing of Rome, a majority of the leading historians were laymen and practical men of affairs rather than churchmen and theologians. Naturally, also, the classical models of historiography were effective in lead ing to an improvement in style and, what was more important, to a greater attention to politi cal and social events and forces — it meant the re-secularization of history. A powerful im pulse in this latter direction came from the be ginnings of modern nationalism in the Italian city-states. Also, the criticism of literary texts produced at least an elementary sense of the value of a critical handling of historical documents. Finally, with the humanists his
tory became more historical. With their cen tre of interest in the culture of a period long past, historical writing could no longer be limited entirely to contemporary history or to a mere repetition of the threadbare 'Chronicle) of Jerome. In the large, however, humanism meant to historical writing a great literary and cultural improvement but much less of an ad vance in scientific method—it was a great im pulse to history as literature but in no such degree to history as a critical science. The canons of Isocrates, Livy and Tacitus rather than of Thucydides and Polybius, were the guide of humanist historians. Nor did human ism bring to historical writing that freedom from subserviency to vested interests and au thority that is commonly supposed. It emanci pated it to a large degree from the theological bias, but substituted a secular restraint which was often as damaging to objectivity and ac curacy. As Professor Burr has well stated the case, °When the Middle Ages waned, the revived study of the ancients and the rise of a lay republic of letters did not at first, one must confess, greatly advance the freedom of his tory. The courtier humanist charged with a biography of his princely patron or a history of his dynasty, the humanist chancellor corn stoned by the city fathers to write the history of the town, was perhaps less free to find or tell the truth than had been the churchly chronicler unhampered by hereditary lords or local vanity. The audience, too, was humanist, and the tyranny of rhetoric, never wholly dispelled throughout the Middle Ages, now reasserted itself with double power. It was the humanist historian's very function to make the glories of his prince or of his city a vehicle for the display of the Latin style to which he owed his post. And if history, thus again an art, a branch of litera ture, dared in a field so secular to shun the mention of ecclesiastical miracle and even to forget the great plan of salvation, it was too often to borrow from the ancients a strange varnish of omen and of prodigy" While it bore no causal relation to humanism, it should be remembered that it was during this period that the printing press was invented and intro duced into general use. It gave a great stimu lus to the °making of books* in the field of his tory, as in other branches of literary effort. In its largest significance for the future of histori cal science, the invention of printing can be com pared only to the original mastery of the art of writing. It is not too much to say that neither Thucydides, Polybius, Blondus, Mabillon nor Ranke was as consequential or indispensable in making possible the present status of his toriography as the inventor of the art of print ing by movable type, be he Coster, Gutenberg or someone yet to be discovered.