83 POPULAR VIEWS OF HISTORY. [IV. reading were points by no means second in interest to the external development of the study of history. These utterances are in themselves valuable as the mature judgments of men who have at all events known how to draw from history precious lessons on the subjects on which they desired to be taught; but they have an additional value in setting plainly before us, teachers of history, the views which popular opinion and the men who lead popular opinion upon educational matters formulate regarding the pursuit to which we have devoted ourselves. T o us a great many of the statements, as well as of the theories, that find enthusiastic echoes in mixed audiences, are apt to appear either truisms, or fallacies, or both. In many of them there is an apologetic tone which reminds us to some extent of what we used to hear in common rooms when our History school was first started, as if the study was one that needed some vindication as a bona fide study, valuable in itself and in its results, before it could be allowed to compete with other older and more organised departments of learning. And, as usual, when that is defended which needs no defence, the theories of the advocate produce an effect diametrically opposite to that which he intended; he seems to hazard on the strength of some occasional or adventitious argument the claim which on its own merits is indisputable. Now far be it from me to attempt even to gather up or analyse, much less to review, the deliberate and elaborate utterances to which I have referred.. I am not going to answer or to refute them where they need refutation, or to use them to strengthen my own theories where I agree with them: it may be enough to say that many of them contain good and sound suggestions which recommend themselves as soon as they are heard; that others are familiar as lecture-room words to all who have any experience in teaching ; and that the worst that can be justly