Scientism and Values.pdf - Ludwig von Mises Institute

Scientism in the Writing of History 155
with historical presentation, cannot be abstracted from the others.
Moreover, is. it not essential to define what is too mllch and what too
little, to stipulate where the golden mean lies? As to that, the "law"
has nothing to say. That has to be defined anew each time by observation.
But indeed, these "laws" of Toynbee's, which in some cases he has
had to formulate in so distressingly vague a manner, rest on very insecure
foundations. They are, if we will take the author's word for it,
the result of an investigation carefully proceeding from fact to fact.
But what are facts in history?
I contend (so I wrote some years ago) 14 that his conception of what
a historical fact really is, of what a historical fact is worth, of what
can be done with it, is open to very grave objections.
Toynbee, with his immense learning, has a multitude of historical
illustrations at his fingers' ends at every turn of his argument, and he
discourses with never-failing brilliance and never-failing confidence on
careers, and personalities of statesmen or thinkers, on tendencies,
movements of thought, social conditions, wars, customs of all countries
and of all ages. Now the critical reader will feel that each single
one of his cases might give rise to discussion. Each could be represented
in a slightly or markedly different way so as no longer to substantiate
his argument. They are not facts; they are subjective presentations of
facts; they are combinations or interpretations of facts. As the foundations
of an imposing superstructure of theory, they prove extraordinarily
shifting and shaky, and this in spite of the dexterity and assurance
with which Toynbee handles them.
Now let me say explicitly that I am far from wanting to confine
history within the narrow bounds of the factual account. In
another essay I wrote: 15
I don't mean that the historian (as he is sometimes advised)
should "stick to the facts": The facts are there to be used. Combinations,
presentations, theories, are indispensable if we want to
understand. But the historian should proceed cautiously in using
the facts for these purposes. It goes without saying that he should
try to ascertain the facts as exactly as possible; but the important
thing is that he should remain conscious, even then, of the element
of arbitrariness, of subjectivity, that necessarily enters into
all combinations of facts, if only because one has. to begin. by se-