who have taken part in it. We have, in a few
instances, departed from this course, for reasons which will suggest
themselves to the reader."

In these sentences may be found the germ of almost the only idea in the
making of this truly admirable book which deserves severe criticism, and
most certainly the severest condemnation should be given to this and all
similar ideas. The notion that history should be written in a way that
will be _satisfactory_ to those engaged in it is radically wrong, unless
perchance by a _satisfactory_ way is meant a way that in point of truth,
accuracy, and fulness, will suit those who have a more or less personal
share in the events to be recorded. But here it is evident that the word
has not this meaning, or at least has a great deal more than this
meaning. In this connection it seems to be a euphemism for _pleasant_.
Certainly no one will dispute that an historian of contemporary events
would find very difficult even the attempt to make his work pleasant to
his contemporaries. It is the endeavor to do this which has vitiated
all the histories so far written of the late Civil War. The same
principle made Thiers's French Revolution an almost worthless book as a
history. To come down to lesser things, the same principle underlying
and pervading all American local histories has done more toward making
them worthless than any other single defect. In the name of truth and
justice we ask, "Why should the writing of history be made satisfactory,
pleasant, to those who aid in the making of it?" We want the _truth_
about the near, as well as the far, past. Let us do unto our descendants
as we would that our ancestors had done by us, and tell them the truth
about ourselves.

Perhaps we ought to be more lenient in the case of this history of
Pittsfield, in consideration of the fact that this was a _public_ work,
and, therefore, more caution had to be exercised than we would otherwise
have expected. Of course no employee would like to displease even a
single member of the corporation that employed him. Possibly the same
argument might be raised in defence of any historian, in that the public
is virtually his employer. Here, however, reasoning by analogy fails,
for the public is a very large body, and will seldom take up the cudgel
in defence of any single individual. This is a question, however, which
should be settled on the ground of right, not of expediency. But even if
the right be left out of acc