SOURCE: "Thucydides and the Philosophy of History," in Thucydides and the History of His Age, Vol. II, Basil Blackwell, 1948, pp. 28-80.

In the following excerpt, Grundy suggests that Thucydides imbued the History with his own philosophical perspective—an "essentially practical" or cynical view-point—despite his claims to objectivity.

The Philosophic Element in Thucydides

Any student or any reader who is interested in Thucydides will require as full a pro of as possible of his aim as an author. In the case of his philosophy the difficulty of acquiring a comprehensive knowledge of it is due to the fact that Thucydides associated, not merely each section, but each item of it with that event in his narrative which suggested it.

The result is not an ordered treatise, but a mass of material scattered, it might almost be said at random, through his work. Thus the collection of it is...