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Excerpt from The History of Masonry, Vol. 10: From the Building of the House of the Lord, and Its Progress Throughout the Civilized World, Down to the Present Time It has been said that the business of a historian is to detail facts, unaccompanied by his opinions in favor of, or against particular theories. Others go further, and say that "theory in history is preposterous." Now all this sounds very well; as all men would be likely to agree in saying that the collation and proper arrangement of facts does indeed constitute history. But it is a question of grave importance, whether, under certain circumstances, it does not become the duty of the historian to do something more than this. How should we, at the present day, be able to arrive at a knowledge of some of the most important events of the middle ages, had not historians, after having detailed the known facts, reasoned from cause to effect, in order to prove the existence of other facts, not self-evident? One class of historians give us a very interesting and somewhat detailed account of the reign of Queen Semiramis, while another class, equally honest and intelligent, tell us that no such Queen ever lived, though both agree in stating the important facts of the supposed reign. Here is a palpable contradiction; and yet is it possible, by the use of other facts and reasonable deductions, drawn from thence, to determine which is right. Even at the present day, witnesses are being exhumed from the bowels of the earth, which, of themselves, speak no language now understood, but when submitted to the antiquarian tests, and compared with other and known developments, are made to testify of important truths which have been buried from the knowledge of men for ages past. It is a historical fact, that Cortes found a stone at the city of Mexico, so large that no man of his, or the present age, has been able to say by what power it had been elevated to its then situation. And must this mystery forever remain necessarily unsolved, because nothing can be found on record to explain it? On the contrary, should the meand be discovered for raising similar bodies, would it not be the business of the historian, after detailing this fact, to reason upon the probability of the use of a similar power by the aborigines of Mexico? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works
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The History of Masonry, Vol. 10
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