[11] He has not always shown even good sense, for, in the _Cours d'études historiques_ (vii. p. 105), where he treats of a work, _De_ _l'histoire_, published in 1670 by Père Le Moyne, a feeble production, to say the least, bearing evident traces of senility, he expresses himself as follows: "I cannot adopt all the maxims and precepts contained in this treatise; but I believe that, after that of Lucian, it is the best we have yet seen, and I greatly doubt whether any of those whose acquaintance we have still to make has risen to the same height of philosophy and originality." Père H. Chérot has given a sounder estimate of the treatise _De l'histoire_ in his _Étude sur la vie et les oeuvres du P. Le Moyne_ (Paris, 1887, 8vo), pp. 406 _sqq._ [12] Bernheim declares, however (ibid. p. 177), that this little work is, in his opinion, the only one which stands at the present level of science. [13] Flint says very well (ibid. p. 15): "The course of Historic has been, on the whole, one of advance from commonplace reflection on history towards a philosophical comprehension of the conditions and processes on which the formation of historical science depends. [14] By P. Guiraud, in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, March 1896, p. 75. [15] Renan has said some of the truest and best things that have ever been said on the historical sciences in _L'Avenir de la science_ (Paris, 1890, 8vo), written in 1848. [16] Some of the most ingenious, some of the most logical, and some of the most widely applicable observations, on the method of the historical sciences, have so far appeared, not in books on methodology, but in the reviews--of which the _Revue Critique d'histoire et de littérature_ is the type--devoted to the criticism of new works of history and erudition. It is a very useful exercise to run through the file of the _Revue Critique_, founded, at Paris, in 1867, "to enforce respect for method, to execute justice upon bad books, to check misdirected and superfluous work." [17] The first edition of the _Lehrbuch_ is dated 1889. [18] The best work that has hitherto been published (in French) on historical method is a pamphlet by MM. Ch. and V. Mortet, _La Science de l'histoire_ (Paris, 1894, 8vo), 88 pp., extracted from vol. xx. of the _Grande Encyclopédie_. [19] One of us, M. Seignobos, proposes to publish later on a complete treatise of Historical Methodology, if there appears to be a public for this class of work.