...if the life of every society belongs to history, much more does the life of that highest and sovereign society which we call a state or a nation. And this in fact is considered the proper subject of history ; — insomuch that if we speak of it simply, without any qualifying epithet, we understand by it not the biography of any subordinate society, but of some one or more of the great national societies of the human race, whatever political form their bond of connexion may assume. And thus we get a somewhat stricter definition of history properly so called ; we may describe it not simply as the biography of a society, but as the biography of a political society or commonwealth.
Many other scholars of history argued along the same lines, stressing how valuable it was to learn the story of the nation, with the express purpose of defending and promoting it. In 1872 William Stubbs, Bishop of Oxford, founded an entire School of Modern History at Oxford, which offered a set program of postclassical historical study. Although