y, and even when the historian professes to have been an
eye-witness, the range of his observation is necessarily limited, and
he cannot be put into the witness-box and cross-examined. Is there
then no way of ascertaining historical fact? Must we reject history as
altogether unworthy of credit?

The rational conclusion only is that very few facts can be established
by descriptive testimony such as would satisfy a Court of Law. Those
who look for such ascertainment are on a wrong track, and are doomed
to disappointment. It is told of Sir Walter Raleigh that when he was
writing his History of the World, he heard from his prison in the
Tower a quarrel outside, tried to find out the rights and the wrongs
and the course of it, and failing to satisfy himself after careful
inquiry, asked in despair how he could pretend to write the history
of the world when he could not find out the truth about what occurred
under his own windows. But this was really to set up an impossible
standard of historical evidence.

The method of testing historical evidence follows rather the lines
of the Newtonian method of Explanation, which we shall afterwards
describe. We must treat any historical record as being itself in the
first place a fact to be explained. The statement at least is extant:
our first question is, What is the most rational way of accounting
for it? Can it be accounted for most probably by supposing the event
stated to have really occurred with all the circumstances alleged? Or
is it a more probable hypothesis that it was the result of an illusion
of memory on the part of the original observer, if it professes to
be the record of an eye-witness, or on the part of some intermediate
transmitter, if it is the record of a tradition? To qualify ourselves
to answer the latter kind of question with reasonable probability
we must acquaint ourselves with the various tendencies to error in
personal observation and in tradition, and examine how far any of
them are likely to have operated in the given case. We must study the
operation of these tendencies within our experience, and apply the
knowledge thus gained. We must learn from actual observation of facts
what the Mythop[oe]ic Faculty is capable of in the way of creation
and transmutation, and what feats are beyond its powers, and then
determine with as near a probability as we can how far it has been
active in the particular case before us.

[Footnote 1: _The Invasion of the Cri