Page:Heresies of Sea Power (1906).djvu/23

 Rh if the teachings of history be properly applied, has answered Captain Mahan, and the same answer has been given by the great body of his disciples in every nation. But each and every writer of importance belonging to this school has laid down that history must be read aright. So much has this been insisted on that before questioning the main thesis we may be disposed to ask whether we can read history aright? If we cannot, then the other question is rendered to a great extent superfluous.

Those who 'make history'—individual combatants—rarely have anything but the haziest impressions as to the general facts, as they are seen by subsequent ages. What they desired to do, or hoped to do, is always inextricably mixed with what they actually accomplished. The exact designs and aspirations of the enemy were of necessity unknown to them, surmise had to replace certainty, and finally their field of vision was of necessity focused on the acts in which they personally took part. Their accounts must always be open to being criticized, and history, therefore, has had to be written by others, who, after hearing and sifting the evidence on both sides, have accepted that version or compromise of versions which appeared most credible. So difficult is this, so hard is it for the historian to eliminate totally any tendencies to unconscious bias, that no trustworthy full history can be