Online Encyclopedia

Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.

BUCKLE, HENRY THOMAS (1821–1862)

Online Encyclopedia
Originally appearing in Volume V04, Page 732 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
» Make a correction to this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Spread the word: del.icio.us del.icio.us it!

See also:

BUCKLE, See also:HENRY See also:THOMAS (1821–1862) , See also:English historian, author of the See also:History of See also:Civilization, the son of Thomas Henry Buckle, a wealthy See also:London See also:merchant, was See also:born at See also:Lee, in See also:Kent, on the 24th of See also:November 1821. Owing to his delicate See also:health he was only a very See also:short See also:time at school, and never at See also:college, but the love of See also:reading having been See also:early awakened in him, he was allowed ample means of gratifying it. He gained his first distinctions not in literature but in See also:chess, being reputed, before he was twenty, one of the first players in the See also:world. After his See also:father's See also:death in See also:January 184o he spent some time with his See also:mother on the See also:continent (1840-1844). He had by that time formed the See also:resolution to See also:direct all his reading and to devote all his energies to the preparation of some See also:great See also:historical See also:work, and during the next seventeen years he bestowed ten See also:hours each See also:day in working out his purpose. At first he contemplated a history of the See also:middle ages, but by 1851 he had decided in favour of a history of civilization. The six years which followed were occupied in See also:writing and rewriting, altering and revising the first See also:volume, which appeared in See also:June 1857. It at once made its author a See also:literary and even social celebrity,—the See also:lion of a London See also:season. On the 19th of See also:March 1858 he delivered at the Royal Institution a public lecture (the only one he ever gave) on the See also:Influence of See also:Women on the Progress of Knowledge, which was published in See also:Fraser's See also:Magazine for See also:April 1858, and reprinted in the first volume of the See also:Miscellaneous and See also:Posthumous See also:Works. On the 1st of April 1859 a crushing and desolating affliction See also:fell upon him in the death of his mother. It was under the immediate impression of his loss that he concluded a See also:review he was writing of J. S.

See also:

Mill's See also:Essay on See also:Liberty with an See also:argument for See also:immortality, based on the yearning of the affections to regain communion with the beloved dead,—on the impossibility of See also:standing up and living, if we believed the separation were final. The argument is a See also:strange one to have been used by a See also:man who had maintained so strongly that we have the testimony of all history to prove the extreme fallibility of consciousness." The review appeared in Fraser's Magazine, May 1859, and is to be found also in the Miscellaneous and Posthumous Works (1872). The second volume of his history was published in May 1861. Soon after he See also:left See also:England for the See also:East, in See also:order to recruit his See also:spirits and restore his health. From the end of See also:October 1861 to the beginning of March 1862 was spent by him in See also:Egypt, from which he went over the See also:desert of See also:Sinai and of See also:Edom to See also:Syria, reaching See also:Jerusalem on the 19th of April 1862. After staying there eleven days, he set out for See also:Europe by Beyrout, but at See also:Nazareth he was attacked by See also:fever; and he died at See also:Damascus on the 29th of May 1862. Buckle's fame, which must See also:rest wholly on his History of Civilization in England, is no longer what it was in the See also:decade following his death. His History is a gigantic unfinished introduction, of which the See also:plan was, first to See also:state the See also:general principles of the author's method and the general See also:laws which govern the course of human progress; and secondly, to exemplify these principles and laws through the histories of certain nations characterized by prominent and See also:peculiar features,—Spain and See also:Scotland, the See also:United States and See also:Germany. Its See also:chief ideas are—(r) That, owing partly to the want of ability in historians, and partly to the complexity of social phenomena, extremely little had as yet been done towards discovering the principles which govern the See also:character and destiny of nations, or, in other words, towards establishing a See also:science of history; (2) That, while the theological See also:dogma of See also:predestination is a barren See also:hypothesis beyond the See also:province of knowledge, and the metaphysical dogma of See also:free will rests on an erroneous belief in the See also:infallibility of consciousness, it is proved by science, and especially by See also:statistics, that human actions are governed by laws as fixed and See also:regular as those which See also:rule in the See also:physical world; (3) That See also:climate, See also:soil, See also:food, and the aspects of nature are the See also:primary causes of intellectual progress,—the first three indirectly, through determining the See also:accumulation and See also:distribution of See also:wealth, and the last by directly influencing the accumulation and distribution of thought,the See also:imagination being stimulated and the understanding subdued when the phenomena of the See also:external world are See also:sublime and terrible, the understanding being emboldened and the imagination curbed when they are small and feeble; (4) That the great See also:division between See also:European and non-European civilization turns on the fact that in Europe man is stronger than nature, and that elsewhere nature is stronger than man, the consequence of which is that in Europe alone has man subdued nature to his service; (5) That the advance of European civilization is characterized by a continually diminishing influence of physical laws, and a continually increasing influence of See also:mental laws; (6) That the mental laws which regulate the progress of society cannot be discovered by the metaphysical method, that is, by the introspective study of the individual mind, but only by such a comprehensive survey of facts as will enable us to eliminate disturbances, that is, by the method of averages; (7) That human progress has been due, not to moral agencies, which are stationary, and which See also:balance one another in such a manner that their influence is unfelt over any See also:long See also:period, but to intellectual activity, which has been constantly varying and advancing:—" The actions of individuals are greatly affected by their moral feelings and passions; but these being antagonistic to the passions and feelings of other individuals, are balanced by them, so that their effect is, in the great See also:average of human affairs, nowhere to be seen, and the See also:total actions of man-See also:kind, considered as a whole, are left to be regulated by the total knowledge of which mankind is possessed "; (8) That individual efforts are insignificant in the great See also:mass of human affairs, and that great men, although they exist, and must " at See also:present " be looked upon as disturbing forces, are merely the creatures of the See also:age to which they belong; (9) That See also:religion, literature and See also:government are, at the best, the products and not the causes of civilization; (ro) That the progress of civilization varies directly as " See also:scepticism," the disposition to doubt and to investigate, and inversely as " credulity " or " the protective spirit," a disposition to maintain, without examination, established beliefs and practices. Unfortunately Buckle either could not define, or cared not to define, the general conceptions with which he worked, such as those denoted by the terms " civilization," " history," " science," " See also:law," " scepticism," and " protective spirit"; the consequence is that his arguments are often fallacies. Moreover, the looseness of his statements and the rashness of his inferences regarding statistical averages make him, as a great authority has remarked, the enfant terrible of moral statisticians. He brought a vast amount of See also:information from the most varied and distant See also:sources to confirm his opinions, and the abundance of his materials never perplexed or burdened him in his argumentation, but examples of well-conducted historical argument are rare in his pages.

He sometimes altered and contorted the facts; he very often unduly simplified his problems; he was very See also:

apt when he had proved a favourite See also:opinion true to infer it to be the whole truth. On the other See also:hand, many of his ideas have passed into the See also:common literary stock, and have been more precisely elaborated by later writers on See also:sociology and history; and though his own work is now somewhat neglected, its influence was immensely valuable in provoking further See also:research and See also:speculation. See his See also:Life by A. W. Huth (188o).

End of Article: BUCKLE, HENRY THOMAS (1821–1862)

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click, and select "copy." Then paste it into your website, email, or other HTML.
Site content, images, and layout Copyright © 2006 - Net Industries, worldwide.
Do not copy, download, transfer, or otherwise replicate the site content in whole or in part.

Links to articles and home page are always encouraged.

[back]
BUCKLAND, WILLIAM (1784–1856) 		[next]
BUCKNER, SIMON BOLIVAR (1823– )

Site © 2006 - Net Industries