ora and fauna of a district from a single specimen.

Regarding truth as 'the most divine thing in Nature,' the very 'eye and
light of history without which it moves a blind thing,' Polybius spared
no pains in the acquisition of historical materials or in the study of
the sciences of politics and war, which he considered were so essential
to the training of the scientific historian, and the labour he took is
mirrored in the many ways in which he criticises other authorities.

There is something, as a rule, slightly contemptible about ancient
criticism. The modern idea of the critic as the interpreter, the
expounder of the beauty and excellence of the work he selects, seems
quite unknown. Nothing can be more captious or unfair, for instance,
than the method by which Aristotle criticised the ideal state of Plato in
his ethical works, and the passages quoted by Polybius from Timaeus show
that the latter historian fully deserved the punning name given to him.
But in Polybius there is, I think, little of that bitterness and
pettiness of spirit which characterises most other writers, and an
incidental story he tells of his relations with one of the historians
whom he criticised shows that he was a man of great courtesy and
refinement of taste--as, indeed, befitted one who had lived always in the
society of those who were of great and noble birth.

Now, as regards the character of the canons by which he criticises the
works of other authors, in the majority of cases he employs simply his
own geographical and military knowledge, showing, for instance, the
impossibility in the accounts given of Nabis's march from Sparta simply
by his acquaintance with the spots in question; or the inconsistency of
those of the battle of Issus; or of the accounts given by Ephorus of the
battles of Leuctra and Mantinea. In the latter case he says, if any one
will take the trouble to measure out the ground of the site of the battle
and then test the manoeuvres given, he will find how inaccurate the
accounts are.

In other cases he appeals to public documents, the importance of which he
was always foremost in recognising; showing, for instance, by a document
in the public archives of Rhodes how inaccurate were the accounts given
of the battle of Lade by Zeno and Antisthenes. Or he appeals to
psychological probability, rejecting, for instance, the scandalous
stories told of Philip of Macedon, simply from the king's general
greatness of characte