For instance, the historically-minded have always understood that
men and women are by definition products of the time in which they live—and so they can only be fairly judged in the context of their era. To judge them by some standard created after their death is by definition to judge them unfairly—because we can never know how they would have acted if they had known what we know.
Or as the famed writer
Louis L’Amour–who put so much historical learning and human insight into his novels—explained, “A mistake constantly made by those who should know better is to judge people of the past by our standards rather than their own. The only way men or women can be judged is against the canvas of their own time.”
