“What is history? No definition will do. … Definitions are tricks for pedants.”
“Descriptions are more telling than are definitions. For such is the nature of human language and of human thinking. Try to ‘define’ such things as beauty or truth or straight. We all know what they are - without their definitions. Yes, ’straight is the shortest possible distance between two points.’ A child does not know that definition, but he knows what straight is. Definitions are the sometimes necessary, surely in natural-scientific matters, instruments for accuracy. But historical knowledge is marked by the aim of understanding, even more than of accuracy, though not necessarily at the expense of the latter. History is always descriptive - and, by necessity, never definitive.”
