For the rest, nothing forbids, and it may even serve a useful purpose, that the history of philosophy and the history of historiography should receive literary treatment in different books, for altogether practical reasons, such, for instance, as the abundance of material and the different training and acquirements needed for the treatment of the different classes of material. But what is _apparently disunited_ by practice thought _really_ unifies; and this real unification is what I have wished to inculcate, without the pedantic idea ever passing through my mind of dictating rules for composing books, as to which it is desirable to leave all liberty of inclusion and exclusion to writers, in conformity with their various intentions.
[1] _Charakteristik der antiken Historiographie_ (Berlin, 1833).
[2] _Geschichte der neueren Historiographie_ (München u. Berlin, Oldenburg, 1911).
[3] _Geschichte der historischen Forschung und Kunst seit der Wiederherstellung der literarischen Cultur in Europa_ (Göttingen, 1812-20).
After what we have said as to the nature of periodization,[1] the usual custom, to which I too bow here, of beginning the history of historiography with that of the Greeks, and with the Greeks of the fifth or sixth century before Christ, will be taken for what it is really worth, but it must not be thought that we thus intend to announce the beginning of historiography, its first appearance in the world, when, on the contrary, all we wish to say is that our interest in the investigation of its course becomes more vivid at that point. History, like philosophy, has no historical beginning, but only an ideal or metaphysical beginning, in so far as it is an activity of thought, which is outside time. Historically speaking, it is quite clear that prior to Herodotus, prior to the logographs, prior indeed to Hesiod and to Homer, history was already, because it is impossible to conceive of men who do not think and do not narrate their deeds in some way or other. This explanation might seem to be superfluous if the confusion between historical beginning and ideal beginning had not led to the fancy of a 'first philosophical step,' made by Thales or Zeno, or by somebody else, by means of which thinking the first stone is supposed to have been laid, as it was believed that by thinking another last step the pinnacle of the edifice of philosophy was or would be attained. But Thales and Herodotus should really be called rather the 'sons' of our interest in the development of those disciplines than the 'fathers' of philosophy and history, and it is we whom those sons salute as their 'fathers.' We have not usually much interest in what occurred prior to them or among people more distant than they from our point of view, not only because there is a scarcity of surviving documents concerning them, but above all because they are forms of thought which have but little connexion with our own actual problems.
