Empathy, Humility, and Good Faith: Studying History in Times of Crisis

Abstract: This essay argues that studying history is an act of empathy, humility, and good faith in times of crisis. Studying past people who have faced their own moments of existential struggle allows individuals to better appreciate how all humans act with limited and uncertain understanding of what is happening to them. Having no good choices, or to being forced to choose between unappealing options, is a far more common part of human history than mythologies (and politics) tend to allow. Recognizing this in forebears who, in their turn, felt despair and bitter disappointment, and used it to hammer out a new social contract that could encompass them, can allow people to find meaning and purpose in their own times of trial.