ABSTRACT
The object of criticism is to discover what in a document may be accepted as true. The document is only the result of a long series of operations, on the details of which the author gives no information. Internal criticism is not, like external criticism, an instrument used for the mere pleasure of using it; it yields no immediate satisfaction, because it does not definitively solve any problem. The most exacting historian is satisfied with an abridged method which concentrates all the operations into two groups. They are: the analysis of the contents of the document, and the positive interpretative criticism which is necessary for ascertaining what the author meant; and the analysis of the conditions under which the document was produced, and its negative criticism, necessary for the verification of the author’s statements. This twofold division of the labour of criticism is, moreover, only employed by a select few.
