THE ERROR OF POMPOUS HISTORY
“Reason will tell you,” wrote George Hakewill in 1627, “that old age or
antiquity is to be accounted by the farther distance from the beginning
and the nearer approach to the end, the times wherein we now live being
in propriety of speech the most ancient since the world’s creation.” The
same thought was expressed by Giordano Bruno in 1564, and by Pascal in
his _Treatise on Vacuum_. “For as old age,” the latter writes, “is that
period of life most remote from infancy, who does not see that old age
in this universal man ought not to be sought in the times nearest his
birth, but in those most remote from it?” “These present times,” says
Bacon, “are the ancient times, when the world is ancient, and not those
which we account ancient, _ordine_ retrogrado by a computation backward
from ourselves.”
It is curious to notice how completely we have all fallen into the error
which these writers expose. We speak naturally of “the elder days,” and
we attribute to any period of the “olden times” an age which is in
reality the sum of all the ages since. We seem to forget that antiquity,
viewed as a period, is only old when we falsely add to it our own weight
of years; and that antiquities, as objects, are only hoary when they
have taken upon them the marks of their slow attainment, century by
century, to the venerable age in which we now live. It is the Present
that is old and hoary, not the Past. It is To-day that is burdened with
the cares of advanced life; and, as compared with its heavy
accountability, the bygone ages are light-hearted, irresponsible and
unsubdued: for it is our own epoch, not theirs, that is encrusted with
the corrosion of time.
When we essay to study history we are accustomed to take the Present as
our standpoint, and, looking back to some remote period, we find it old
with the years we have crossed to reach it. But the historian should
rather take the Past as his natural standpoint, and should forget
To-day; for in dealing with bygone events it is surely obvious that we
have no right to make the circumstances of our present existence our
criterion. We must project ourselves into the youthful ages which we are
studying, and must cast aside the cumbrous habits of thought which have
been built up within us by the experiences of our ripe maturity. There
is only one right way to examine the past years of mankind: we must look
at them as, individually, we look at our own childhood, remembering the
sensations and emotions of those times and contemplating life with those
eyes. We cannot hope to comprehend the outlook of the Past unless we
divest our minds of a large part of the world’s subsequent experience;
for the Past is simply the nursery of the Present, and differs from it
in just that degree in which a boy differs from a man.
The regarding of former ages as being ancient and hoary has led the
historian to introduce them to the reader in an unnecessarily sober and
heavy manner. It has long been the habit to write history as though the
story of the Past were a solemn subject calling for a grave and even
melancholy treatment. The writing of an historical treatise is usually
regarded as a legitimate opportunity for the display of the author’s
turn for rhythmic prose or knowledge of punctuation and grammar.
Rolling, dignified words, sentences which frown in their tremendousness,
periods staid and smooth, are employed as the means whereby the picture
of the Past, as he sees it, may be conveyed to the imagination of his
readers. Macaulay even speaks of a certain subject as being “beneath the
dignity of history.” The historian fails to see that it is not the
giving out of the facts, but only their discovery, which requires
ponderous study.
The men and women who walked the earth in the days of its youth are not
antiquated: the up-to-date young men and the modern young women are the
real old fogies, for they are the tenants of the world’s old age, the
products of the most ancient phase of the human story. To the Past we
must go as a relief from To-day’s harshness; for the Past is spread out
before us as a children’s garden, where jolly laughter and sudden,
quick-ended tears are to be experienced; where the waters are alive with
mermen and the woods are filled with brownies; where nymphs and fairies
dwell among the flowers, and enchanted castles crown the hilltops; where
heroes die for fame, and the victors marry kings’ daughters. There in
that garden we may forget the mature cruelty and the sins of the present
time; for if there be wickedness in the Past, we may usually name it the
thoughtless mischief of childhood.
One contemplates with positive relief the tortures and massacres of the
distant ages, for they are child’s play as compared with the reasoned
brutality of these wicked olden days in which we now live. How pleasant
it is to turn from the organised beastliness of our own times to the
irresponsible slaughter of the early Christians in Rome or to the
wholesale impalings and flayings which followed an Assyrian battle! In
the last-named cases we are but shocked at the suffering inflicted by
the inhabitants of the world’s nursery upon one another; but in the
other we are appalled by the spectacle of humanity’s old men gleefully
slaughtering one another.
The historian should always remember that by rights it is to the days of
long ago that he and his readers ought to turn for those scenes which
make their special appeal to the ardent eyes of youth. It is into the
early times that we must all wander when, sick of life’s conformity and
weary of the cramped stiffness of the conventions amongst which we move,
we would breathe the unenclosed air of a freer order of things. He must
not, therefore, amidst the stately forest of his phrases hide the
gateway of this joyous domain both from himself and his followers. It
should stand open and unconcealed at the end of the highroad which leads
from the Present to the Past; so that all those who make the great
adventure and set out in search of the forgotten years shall, by his
direction, find that gateway and pass through it into the land where the
burden of To-day’s old age drops from the shoulders and the buoyancy of
the early times stimulates and enlivens.
There, in those enchanted regions, men are heroes and women are
beautiful, and all that the heart desires is to be found. There, and
perhaps only there, grow “the flower of peace, and the rose that cannot
wither.” Beyond that gateway stand the gorgeous palaces wherein sit the
queens of the young world, of whose beauty the fairest women of our own
age have but a semblance. There they rest upon their marble thrones,
their loveliness causing the brain to reel and the heart to faint; and
into their presence the initiate may penetrate, unchecked and
unannounced. Here in this garden a man may at will become one with burly
Antony; and with pleasant arrogance may mount the dais’ steps to
Cleopatra’s side, and put his arm about her bewildering shoulders. He
may merge himself into splendid Lucullus, and watch with mild amusement
the amazement of his self-invited guests, Cicero and Pompey, served at a
moment’s notice with a fifty-thousand drachmæ dinner in the sumptuous
apartment called “Apollo.”
In the twinkling of an eye, for so mighty is the magic of the garden, he
may turn from Lucullus to become that Roman’s enemy, the swift-footed
royal athlete Mithradates, wooing the reluctant Monime in the palace of
Miletus on the banks of Meander. Now he is young Cimon, intoxicated by
the beauty of Asteria of Salamis; and now he is Demetrius in the happy
toils of the fair Lamia. Mounting the magic carpet he may leap over the
seas and deserts to Babylon, where, with a gesture, he may become one
with Sargon, and may parade the hanging gardens in the light of the
tremendous moon. Away he may fly once more to the valley of the Nile,
whence, in the guise of King Unis, he may ascend the “ladder of the
sun,” burst open the “double gates of the sky,” and play with “the
imperishable stars.”
There is no end to the entertainment which he may enjoy in the Garden of
the Past; and, coming back, happy and breathless, to his home in the
Present, is it to be supposed that he, who is bursting with what he has
seen and done, will desire to record in heavy and stately language the
adventures he has experienced in that irresponsible playground? He who
writes the history of the Past in pompous phrases has never left the
Present.
If, in revolt against his urban inaction, a man desires to kick his
heels in the freedom of other lands, he need not travel to Monte Carlo
or to Paris, there to shock the astonished natives by behaving himself
in a manner not permitted in the city of his birth: he may, instead,
seat himself by his fireside and, book in hand, may transport his
cumbrous form to countries and periods which will view his
eccentricities without amazement. Who will there question his sanity if
he dress himself in seaweed and flounder about the floor, pretending to
be a fish? Did not the Society of Inimitable Livers thus amuse
themselves in the royal palace of Alexandria? Or who will accuse him of
intemperance if he take his place amongst the guests at a feast in
Memphis, and dance a jig for the applause of Pharaoh? Has not Pharaoh
himself said, as Harkhuf tells us, “My Majesty desires to see this man
dance more than the treasure of Sinai, more than the gifts of Pount”?
If he be in search of joke and jest, can he do better than read the
tales of mankind’s youth? By his fireside, and exerting no muscle in the
search for a merry atmosphere, he may see the worthy Antigonus, now
grown old, walking the paved street of his city to pay a visit to his
son Demetrius who lies ill in yonder house. He may watch the stern old
man, as he is about to enter the door, met by a beautiful damsel who is
coming out through it. Antigonus passes her without a sign, and entering
the sickroom sits himself down by his son’s bed and feels his pulse.
“The fever has just left me,” he may hear the young man say. “Yes,”
replies his father, looking straight before him, “I met it going out at
the door.” Or again, with no effort of the ears or eyes, he may see
Marcus Appius rise in his place in a court at Rome and open his final
speech for the defence with the words “I have been desired by my client
to employ on his behalf industry, eloquence and fidelity ...”; and he
may hear the caustic Cicero respond in an undertone “And how have you
had the heart not to accede to any one of his requests?”
If he be in search of love, there in the Past he will find it; for the
bygone ages contain in themselves all the love of every man and woman
who has ever lived. If he be concerned in the pursuit of beauty, there
will he behold it; for all the loveliness that the sun and moon have
looked upon are now become part of the Past. But, above all, if he be in
quest of his childhood, of the high hopes and the beating pulse of
youth, there in the playground of the Past he will find them.
In recent years there has been a very considerable tendency amongst
jaded people to revive within themselves the pleasures of their
childhood by an ardent, though often somewhat forced, emulation of the
habits of infancy. The charm of the grown man or woman who can play
joyously with children, and can enter enthusiastically into their
amusements, has been perceived, and an attempt has been made to acquire
this faculty. To play with children, however, requires the employment of
a rare talent, of a difficult art; and there are many who, though loving
the society of the young, feel aware after a while of the loss of a real
interest in their pretences. It is no longer a pleasure, nay it is an
agony, to fall headlong upon the lawn in the manner of a slain warrior;
it is with a distressing effort of body and mind that we may now crawl
under the bed and believe ourselves thus to have penetrated into an
Oriental castle.
To those who desire to retain their childhood’s atmosphere yet are
conscious of these difficulties, a study of the days when the world was
young comes as the supplying of a long-felt want. We who in our
individual lives realise with sorrow how very far we have travelled from
the schoolroom and the nursery, need not struggle vainly to revive
interest in our own forgotten games; we may hasten instead to the
world’s childhood, there whole-heartedly to romp and wrestle, laugh and
cry, make-believe and frolic, with the men and women of the Past. We
shall not find ourselves too clumsy to play with _their_ toys, nor too
big to crawl into _their_ houses, for their toys are real armies and
kingdoms, and their houses real palaces of marble.
The writing of the history of the Past--I do not mean the collection of
the data upon which the narrative is based--must no longer be regarded
as the particular field of the very serious: rather let the deeds of
To-day claim the dignified treatment of weighty men; for the Present and
not the Past is the antiquated age, the age hung with cobwebs, the age
that is as old as the hills. The story which the historian has to tell
should be made to glow in the imagination, to be young and virile and
full of the element of life; for of all men the student of the Past is
the most closely in touch with Youth.
INDEX
Akhmim, 246-8
Akhnaton, 20, 86, 153-173, 184-9, 239
Alabaster, quarries, 235-44
Amenhotepsase, 118
Amenophis II., 157
Amenophis III., 155-60, 168, 175-6
Amon-Ra, 47-68, 159-72, 178
Amorites, 169
Anena, 13
Ani, 130
Archæology, study of, 3-45, 84-108
Asceticism, 117-8
Ashmolean Museum, 35
Athenæus, 130
Aton, 159-78, 183, 196
Atum of Heliopolis, 159
Ay, 181, 189
Ayrton, Mr., 191
Bacon, 328
Bast, 129
Bedel, 51, 55
Breasted, Prof., 52, 166, 278
Browne, Sir Thomas, 92
Brugsch, Emil, 137
Bubastis, 129-30
Burke, Edmund, 89
Cambyses, 92
Carnarvon, Lord, 101, 137, 142
Carnarvon Tablet, 87
Carter, Howard, 14, 101, 137, 185
Charlemagne, 138
Charles II., 44
Coleridge, 32, 45
Cromer, Lord, 87
Dalison, Max, 191
Dancing, 126-9
Davis, Theodore M., 142-3, 153, 190-1
Dead, excavation of, 84-108
Death, 43-5, 278-80
Dion, 130
Drinking, 129-32
Dryden, John, 19
Dwarfs, 222
Earle, Thomas, 35
Egyptian Government grants for archæological work, 102
Egyptians, ancient, temperament of, 109-35
Egyptology, study of, 3-45, 84-108
Elephantine, 216-31
Erman, Prof., 278
Excavation, 84-108, 136-52
Fairyland, 283-303
Feast of lamps, 119
Folk-tales, 123-4
Futurism, 70-6
Gardiner, Alan, 288
German treatment of French and Belgian antiquities, 69-83
Golenischeff, M., 46
Gordon, General, 207
Grenfell, Lord, 205
Hakewill, George, 328
Hathor, 129
Herhor, 47, 52, 60, 119
Herkhuf, 221-8, 333
Hetebe, 66-7
Hicks Pasha, 207
History, teachings of, 75-9, 328-36
Horemheb, 13, 174-97
Hunting, 132
Hyksos Wars, 87
Imhotep, 113
Jesus Christ, 91
Jones, Harold, 191
Josephus, 133
Juvenal, 208
Kandake, Queen, 201, 232
Khaemhet, 13
Korôsko, 207
Macaulay, 330
Mariette, 99
Marinetti, 70
Maspero, Sir Gaston, 306, 318, 320
Mengebet, 49, 53, 56
Merira, 168
Montalembert, 73
Morgan, M. de, 137
Mummies, excavation of, 84-108, 116
Museums, 10-16
Music, 125-6
Mutnezem, 182-3
Names, 123
Neferhotep, 113, 196
Nefertiti, 161
Nesubanebded, 47, 49, 52, 58, 60
Nubia, Lower, 198-234
Paheri, 131
Pascal, 328
Patonemheb, 184
Pepy II., 222-3
Petrie, Prof. Flinders, 138, 141, 312
Petronius, 201, 232
Philodemus, 39
Pigmies, 222
Roosevelt, Theodore, 18
Sabna, 223-8
Schiaparelli, Prof., 146
Second Advent, 91
Seeley, 88
Senusert III., 140
Sethe, Prof., 258
Setna, Prince, 124
_Shêkh-el-beled_, 99
Shelley, 214
Smenkhkara, 189
Smith, Prof. G. Elliot, 89, 156-7
Smith, Joseph Lindon, 143
Snefferu, 119
“Song of the Harper,” 87
Songs, 114-6
Stanley, Dean, 19
Strabo, 130
Tabubna, 124
Taine, 88
Theban thieves, 304-27
Thieves, 304-27
Thucydides, 88
Thutmosis III., 120, 142, 157, 175
Thutmosis IV., 157
Tiy, Queen, 12, 143, 155-172, 175
Tombs, excavation of, 84-108, 111
Toshkeh, 205
Tuau, 142
Tutankhamon, 101, 137, 171-2, 180, 189-90
Uba-ana, 118
Wady Sabu’a, Temple of, 200
Wady Salamûni, 245-61
Wenamon, 47-68, 119
Wine-drinking, 130-2
Worcester, Earl of, 44
Yamani, Nikola, 317-20
Yuaa, 142, 145, 157
Zakar-Baal, 52, 54, 57-65
Zazamankh, 119
_A Selection from the Catalogue of_
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Complete Catalogues sent on application Osiris And The Egyptian
Resurrection
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FOOTNOTES:
[1] See my _Catalogue of Weights and Balances in the Cairo Museum_, p.
xvi.
[2] The translation is based on that of Prof. Breasted.
[3] Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Lindon Smith.
[4] A few paragraphs in this chapter also appear in my “Life and Times
of Akhnaton, Pharaoh of Egypt.”
[5] Professor Breasted’s translation.
[6] The various rock-inscriptions of Lower Nubia mentioned in this
chapter were found during a tour which I made in that country in the
autumn of 1906, and are recorded in my “Antiquities of Lower Nubia
and their Condition in 1906-7,” published for the Egyptian Government
by the University Press, Oxford. The evidence for the locating of the
various tribes is also given there.
[7] I can hardly suppose that I was the first to observe this road, and
yet I can find no reference to it in any publication.
[8] Sinuhe, 254-256.
[9] Papyrus Koller, 5, 1-4.
[10] Anastasi Papyri, 4, 5, 5ff.
[11] Kubbân stela.
[12] The average cubit was about 20-1/2 inches.
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
week-chested youths=> weak-chested youths {pg 8}
That I mght gaze=> That I might gaze {pg 39}
he is conforted=> he is comforted {pg 41}
stocks and stones=> sticks and stones {pg 95}
number or varieties=> number of varieties {pg 130}
astonishd the people=> astonished the people {pg 181}
Nile beween Korôsko=> Nile between Korôsko {pg 200}
to the Egyptolgist=> to the Egyptologist {pg 201}
pride themselves=> pride themeselves {pg 265}