This page is not for you, boys and girls.
It is for that old man or woman—twenty,
thirty, or forty years old, who may peek
into this book; and is what they would
call the
PREFACE
To give the child some idea of what has gone on in the world before he arrived;
To take him out of his little self-centered, shut-in life, which looms so large because it is so close to his eyes;
To extend his horizon, broaden his view, and open up the vista down the ages past;
To acquaint him with some of the big events and great names and fix these in time and space as a basis for detailed study in the future;
To give him a chronological file with main guides, into which he can fit in its proper place all his further historical study—
Is the purpose of this first SURVEY OF THE WORLD’S HISTORY.