The ancient Greek historians (Harvard lectures) by J. B. Bury.

256 ANCIENT GREEK HISTORIANS LECT.

of Leibniz. In 1750 Turgot stated a theory of
historical progress very clearly. But though the
doctrine was not new at the time of the French
Revolution, the full significance of the idea was
first impressed on the world in the famous book of
Turgot's friend, Condorcet, Esquisse d'un tableau
historique des progres de l'esprit hum)ain (1795).
Here the meaning of the historical process was
declared to be social and political progress. It
is easy to see that this view, which was diffused
by the writings of Comte and Buckle, as well as
by the speculations of Saint-Simon and Fourier,
was calculated to stimulate interest in the past
more powerfully than any previous conception.
It imparts to history an intenser meaning. We are
led to conceive the short development which is
behind us and the long development which is
before us as coherent parts of a whole; our " pragmatic" interest in the destinies of our race necessarily communicates a "pragmatic" interest to its
past fortunes.
"Progress" of course implies a judgment of value,
and is not scientific. It assumes a standard,some end or ends, by relation to which we judge
historical movements and declare that they mean
progress. We have no proof that absolute progress has been made, for we have no knowledge of
an absolute end; and, therefore, scientifically we
are not justified in speaking of the history of
civilised man as progress; we can only be sure that
it is a causal sequence of transformations.