I rejoined, “Why not just study the men around you today? Who cares what happened centuries ago?” She finally made this point clear to me. She said, “How will I know what facts represent man by his nature, and which are mere historical moods or fashions? If I look around today there is tremendous evidence for the desire for conformity. I know it is not true because I know there were the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. I know what man was like in a different era, and therefore I am able to abstract what is the essential that runs through all eras and conditions, and what is just a local
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