Chapter 2 Chapter two

What forces push the nations forward? Some biographers and historians of the history of individual peoples regard this power as the natural power of heroes and rulers.According to their interpretation of history, the occurrence of historical events is entirely determined by the will of Napoleon and Alexander.The answer of such historians to the question of the forces that move historical events is satisfactory only if there is only one historian in the world, and only one account of each historical event.However, once historians from different countries with different views discuss the same historical event, their various answers suddenly lose all meaning, because their understanding of this force is not only different, but often completely opposite.One historian says that a certain event was caused by the power of Napoleon; another says that it was caused by the power of Alexander;Moreover, such historians contradict each other even when they explain the forces on which someone's power rests.The Bonapartist Thiers said that Napoleon's power was based on his virtue and genius, the republican Langfry said that his power was based on his cunning and deception of the people.Such historians attack each other so that people cannot understand the forces that produce historical events, and they cannot even provide any decent answers to the question of what is the essence of history.General historians who study the history of various countries seem to be aware of the injustice of monographed biographers in their view of the forces that cause historical events. The result of the interaction of forces of different tendencies.Therefore, general historians of the world, when describing a war or the conquest of a nation, do not seek the cause from the power of a certain character, but from the interaction of many characters related to the event.

On this view, the power of historical figures, since it is produced by the interaction of many forces, seems impossible to regard it as a force that causes events.However, most general historians of the world still regard power as a force that brings about historical events and treats it as the cause of events.According to their stated views, a historical figure is a product of his time and his power is the result of the interaction of different forces; whereas the power of a historical figure is a force that causes events.For example, Gephenus, Slosa, and others, sometimes prove that Napoleon was a product of the revolution, of the ideology of 1789, etc., and at other times simply say that 1812 The expedition and other events they disliked were nothing but the product of Napoleon's wrong will, and the ideological development of 1789 was blocked by Napoleon's arbitrary will.Revolutionary ideas, general sentiments produced Napoleon's regime, and Napoleon's regimes repressed revolutionary ideas and public sentiments.

-------- ① Gefeinus (1805～1871), a German historian and literary historian in the 19th century. ② Slotha (1776~1861), a German historian in the nineteenth century. This strange paradox is no accident.Not only can this situation be seen everywhere, but the works of general historians of the world are composed of this series of contradictions from beginning to end.This kind of contradiction arises because general historians give up halfway as soon as they embark on the road of analyzing contradictions. To combine several component forces into a resultant force, the resultant force must be equal to the sum of the component forces. General historians in the world have never abided by this basic condition. In this case, we have to assume that there is an unexplainable force affecting the resultant force.

Thematic historians, when they discuss the expedition of 1813 or the restoration of the Bourbons, point out quite bluntly that these events were caused by Alexander's personal will.But the general historian Gefeinus categorically denies this view of thematic historians. He tried to prove that the expedition of 1813 and the restoration of the Bourbon dynasty were not only due to Alexander's will, but also due to Stein, Metter Nie, Madame Staer, Talleyrand, Fichte, Setobrien, and others. The biographer apparently divides Alexander's power into the following components: Talleyrand, Sedobrien, and so on.The sum of these components, which is the role of Chéteaubrien, Talleyrand, Madame de Stael, and others, obviously does not amount to the whole resultant force, that is to say, does not amount to the obedience of millions of French to the Bourbons. This phenomenon.To show, therefore, the manner in which these component forces become the cause of the submission of millions of men, that is to say, how those component forces equal to one A result in a resultant force equal to a thousand A, the historian He had to go back to the force he denied—power, and admitted that power was the resultant force of those forces, that is to say, he had to admit an unexplainable force that affected the resultant force.This is what general historians do.The result is that they not only contradict the thematic historians, but also contradict themselves.

The country people don't understand the reason for the rain. They say "the wind blows the clouds away" or "the wind blows the clouds back" according to whether they want rain or sunshine.So also the general historians, sometimes, when they wish to say so, when it accords with their theory, say that power is the product of events, and when they need to confirm other thesis, they say: "Power creates events." A third class of historians, the so-called cultural historians, who follow the path blazed by the general historians, sometimes sees writers and women as forces that cause events.Their understanding of this power is completely different, and they believe that the so-called cultural and intellectual activities are this kind of power.

Cultural historians follow exactly the path taken by previous general historians, because if historical events can be explained by the relationship between certain people, why can't historical events be explained by the fact that certain people wrote certain books ?The cultural historian picks out the feature of intellectual activity from among the multitude of features that accompany every important phenomenon, and claims that this feature is the cause of the event.But in spite of their efforts to prove that events were caused by intellectual activity, it is only by making major concessions that we can admit that there is something in common between intellectual activity and national movements.However, in any case we cannot admit that it is intellectual activities that guide people's actions, because the doctrine of the equality of all people caused the brutal massacres of the French Revolution, and the doctrine of fraternity caused criminal wars and executions. This assumption contradicts.

But even if it were admitted that the grotesque assertions that abound in history books are true, that peoples are governed by an indeterminate force called ideas, the main problems of history remain unanswered, or, To the power of the king, in addition to the influence of advisers and others proposed by the general historian of the world, there is also a force-idea, and the relationship between the idea and the masses remains to be explained.It would be understandable if Napoleon had power, so events happened.Taking a step back, it is also understandable that Napoleon combined with other forces to become the cause of events.But how a "Convention of the People" can make the French kill each other, it is impossible to understand without explaining the causal relationship between this power and that event.

-------- ①The original text of "On the Civil Contract" is in French. Undoubtedly, there is a connection between living things that exist at the same time, so there is also a connection between the intellectual activities of men and their historical movements, just as between human activities and commerce, handicrafts, This connection can be found in gardening, or any other industry.But why cultural historians believe that human intellectual activities are the cause or expression of all historical activities is puzzling.This conclusion of historians can only be explained by the following two points: first, history is written by scholars, so they naturally like to think that the activities of their class are the basis of all human activities, just like merchants, farmers and Soldiers would have the same idea (just not expressed in words since merchants and soldiers don't write history).Second, spiritual activity, education, civilization, culture, thought—these are vague and indefinite concepts, under the guise of which it is easier to use words that are more ambiguous and thus can be compiled into theory at will. .

But, leaving aside the intrinsic value of such historical works (which are likely to be useful to someone or something), it is worth noting that cultural history is getting closer to general history, and these historians carefully Analyzing religions, philosophies, and political doctrines as the causes of historical events, historiography unconsciously places Such a historical event is said to be a product of power, and the expedition is said to be a product of Napoleon's will.If cultural historians say so, they can't help but contradict themselves.For this case shows that the new power they invented cannot account for various historical events, and that the power they seem unwilling to admit is the only way to understand history.