calendars!

And from carelessness as to dates they passed to contempt for facts.

What is important is the philosophy of history!

Bouvard could not finish the celebrated discourse of Bossuet.

"The eagle of Meaux is a farce-actor! He forgets China, the Indies, and
America; but is careful to let us know that Theodosius was 'the joy of
the universe,' that Abraham 'treated kings as his equals,' and that the
philosophy of the Greeks has come down from the Hebrews. His
preoccupation with the Hebrews provokes me."

Pecuchet shared this opinion, and wished to make him read Vico.

"Why admit," objected Bouvard, "that fables are more true than the
truths of historians?"

Pecuchet tried to explain myths, and got lost in the _Scienza Nuova_.

"Will you deny the design of Providence?"

"I don't know it!" said Bouvard. And they decided to refer to Dumouchel.

The professor confessed that he was now at sea on the subject of
history.

"It is changing every day. There is a controversy as to the kings of
Rome and the journeys of Pythagoras. Doubts have been thrown on
Belisarius, William Tell, and even on the Cid, who has become, thanks to
the latest discoveries, a common robber. It is desirable that no more
discoveries should be made, and the Institute ought even to lay down a
kind of canon prescribing what it is necessary to believe!"

In a postscript he sent them some rules of criticism taken from Daunou's
course of lectures:

"To cite by way of proof the testimony of multitudes is a bad method of
proof; they are not there to reply.

"To reject impossible things. Pausanias was shown the stone swallowed by
Saturn.

"Architecture may lie: instance, the arch of the Forum, in which Titus
is called the first conqueror of Jerusalem, which had been conquered
before him by Pompey.

"Medals sometimes deceive. Under Charles IX. money was minted from the
coinage of Henry II.

"Take into account the skill of forgers and the interestedness of
apologists and calumniators."

Few historians have worked in accordance with these rules, but all in
view of one special cause, of one religion, of one nation, of one party,
of one system, in order to curb kings, to advise the people, or to offer
moral examples.

The others, who pretend merely to narrate, are no better; for everything
cannot be told--some selection must be made. But in the selection of
documents some special predilection will have the upper hand, and, as
this varies