SELF-CULTURE FOR GIRLS.
PART VI.
In the preceding chapters we have dealt with the subject of reading in general, and have mentioned many books of the olden world that must not be ignored, besides some histories, with historical fiction side by side, which may serve as stepping-stones down through the centuries to the present day, or up through the centuries to the dawn of history, whichever way you prefer to take your journey. As to whether you should read history backwards or forwards, much depends on your present stock of knowledge. If circumstances have unfortunately left you ignorant, even of the history of your own country, you would be scarcely fitted to begin a Greek history, but should choose, in the first place, an English history, or historical primer, that you can understand.
The majority of girls who read this page will, however, possess a fair knowledge of English history, and may at once begin their study of ancient civilisations, which will help them in no small degree to understand the present. Or they may, with advantage, consult Professor Freeman’s General Sketch of History, with maps, published at 3s. 6d. by Macmillan. The constant aim of this admirable little book is to show the connection in history, and it is the best introductory book for the general reader.
No cultivated person can live in an easy conviction that modern civilisation is all that needs attention, and that “the old heathen” is a suitable description of sages and philosophers of yore.
We must not omit to say that the advanced student in history will need some good history of the Renaissance—Walter Pater’s or John Addington Symonds’—to enlighten her as to the great awakening of the human intellect in the fifteenth century.
Biography is an admirable channel for the learning of history. Herodotus, the “Father of history,” showed us that history is really only a series of stories about people, and if any reader can glance at Rawlinson’s translation, she will become aware of this. Unfortunately history is so long that these “stories” have, as a rule, to be compressed, and so lose their living interest.
Perhaps the present generation cannot recall the charm of the First History of Rome, and the First History of Greece, by the author of Amy Herbert, used as school-books, in contrast to the ordinary English history. The present writer used to wonder why Roman history was so delightful, English history so dull, and why the former could always be remembered—the latter, never! It was just because those elementary manuals of Greek and Roman history—as to whose intrinsic value we are expressing no opinion whatever—used the “story” method of dealing with their subject.