Churchill And The Study Of History

Here is a passage from the first volume of Winston Churchill's History of The English Speaking Peoples.  This passage concludes Churchill's discussion of the conflict between church and crown in the reign of Henry II.  Although Henry II's reign included the murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket, Churchill draws our attention to the manner of resolution of these squabbles.  He writes:

It is proof of the quality of the age that these fierce contentions, shaking the souls of men, should have been so rigorously and yet so evenly fought out.  In modern conflicts and revolutions in some great states bishops and archbishops have been sent by droves to concentration camps, or pistolled in the nape of the neck in the well-warmed, brilliantly lighted corridor of a prison.  What claim have we to vaunt a superior civilisation to Henry II's times?  We are sunk in a barbarism all the deeper because it is tolerated by moral lethargy and covered with a veneer of scientific conveniences.

The footnote at this point in the text indicates that Churchill wrote this passage in 1938.

There are many lessons to be drawn from this passage.  Let's discuss just one.  It has to do with the study of history.  It is often stated that the reason to study history is, in the words of George Santayana, "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."  There is much truth here.  But the study of history serves another purpose.  An historical understanding is one which allows for perspective, to compare our place and time to other places and times.  This perspective should militate against the impatience of ideology.  Knowing how our times compare to others should engender in us a modesty suggested in Churchill's passage.  History allows us to see the limits of human endeavors, thus moderating the demands we make in the here and now.  If we are ignorant of history all we know is the now, and we come to expect everything now.  This demand for perfection leads to inevitable disappointment and perhaps anger, an anger that can be exploited by ambitious leaders.  But someone steeped in historical understanding expects less from politics and thus is less likely to be angered by expectations not met.  He is less susceptible to the false promises of ambitious politicians.  This is one reason among many why a study of history is important to a free people.