It is an important principle in morals and in politics, not to mistake
the cause for the pretext, nor the pretext for the cause, and by this
means to distinguish between the concealed and the ostensible motive. On
this principle, history might be recomposed in a new manner; it would
not often describe _circumstances_ and _characters_ as they usually
appear. When we mistake the characters of men, we mistake the nature of
their actions; and we shall find in the study of secret history, that
some of the most important events in modern history were produced from
very different motives than their ostensible ones. Polybius, the most
philosophical writer of the ancients, has marked out this useful
distinction of _cause_ and _pretext_, and aptly illustrates the
observation by the facts which he explains. Amilcar, for instance, was
the first author and contriver of the second Punic war, though he died
ten years before the commencement of it. "A statesman," says the wise
and grave historian, "who knows not how to trace the origin of events,
and discern the different sources from whence they take their rise, may
be compared to a physician who neglects to inform himself of the causes
of those distempers which he is called in to cure. Our pains can never
be better employed than in searching out the causes of events; for the
most trifling incidents give birth to matters of the greatest moment and
importance." The latter part of this remark of Polybius points out
another principle which has been often verified by history, and which
furnished the materials of the little book of "Grands Evenemens par les
petites Causes."