There are some who willingly admit that the labours of erudition are useful, but ask impatiently whether "the editing of a text" or "the deciphering of a Gothic parchment" is "the supreme effort of the human mind," and whether the intellectual ability implied by the practice of external criticism does or does not justify "all the fuss made over those who possess it." On this question, obviously devoid of importance, a controversy was held between M. Brunetière, who recommended scholars to be modest, and M. Boucherie, who insisted on their reasons for being proud, in the pages of the _Revue des langues romanes_, 1880, vols. i and ii. [105] There have been men who were critics of the first water where external criticism alone was concerned, but who never rose to the conception of higher criticism, or to a true understanding of history. [106] Renan, _Essais de morale et de critique_, p. 36. [107] "If it were only for the sake of the severe mental discipline, I should not think very highly of the philosopher who had not, at least once in his life, worked at the elucidation of some special point" (_L'Avenir de la science_, p. 136). [108] On the question whether it is necessary for every one to do "all the preliminary grubbing for himself," cf. J. M. Robertson, "Buckle and His Critics" (London, 1895, 8vo), p. 299. [109] Renan, _L'Avenir de la science_, p. 230. [110] A university professor is in a very good position for discouraging and encouraging vocations; but "it is by personal effort that the goal (critical skill) must be attained by the students, as Waitz well said in an academic oration; the teacher's part in this work is small...." (_Revue Critique_, 1874, ii. p. 232). [111] Quoted by Fr. X. von Wegele, _Geschichte der deutschen Historiographie_ (München, 1885, 8vo), p. 653. [112] Renan, ibid., p. 125. [113] B. Hauréau, _Notices et extraits de quelques manuscrits latins de la Bibliothèque nationale_, i. (Paris, 1890, 8vo). p. v. [114] _Bibliothèque de l'École des chartes_, 1896, p. 88. Compare analogous traits in the interesting intellectual biography of the Hellenist, palæographer, and bibliographer, Charles Graux, by E. Lavisse (_Questions d'enseignement national_, Paris, 1885, 18mo, pp. 265 _sqq._). [115] See H. A. L. Fisher in the _Fortnightly Review_, Dec. 1894, p. 815.