1947 and 1957, he was Provost of Oriel College, Oxford. Clark wrote a general introduction to the second edition of the Cambridge Modern History (1957), criticising the belief of some historians (in particular Lord Acton who had edited the first edition over half a century earlier) that eventually it would be possible to write an "ultimate history", rather they should expect their works to be built on and superseded by later historians. He stated that "knowledge of the past has come down through one or more human minds, has been processed by them, and therefore cannot consist of elemental and impersonal atoms which nothing can alter..." Between the 1930s and 1960s, Clark was the editor overseeing the Oxford History of England series and wrote Volume X: The Later Stuarts, 1660–1714 (1934), which was the first of the series to be published. His The Seventeenth Century appeared in 1929, and he wrote numerous other monographs. He was twice editor of the English Historical Review. He delivered the Wiles Lectures in the Queen's University of Belfast in October 1956. They were published as War and Society in the Seventeenth Century (Cambridge UP, 1958). Honours He was knighted in the 1953 Coronation Honours List. Clark was elected Fellow of the British Academy (FBA) in 1936. He was a Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1953 he was elected an honorary fellow of Trinity College Dublin. References External links 1890 births 1979 deaths Military personnel from Yorkshire British Army personnel of World War I London Regiment officers British World War I prisoners of war Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford Fellows of All Souls College, Oxford Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge Economic historians People educated at Manchester Grammar School Chichele Professors of Economic History Historians of England Honorary Fellows of Trinity College Dublin Presidents of the British Academy Provosts of Oriel College, Oxford People educated at Bootham School Members of the University of Cambridge faculty of history Fellows of the British Academy Knights Bachelor World War I prisoners of war held by Germany British male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights 20th-century English historians 20th-century English male writers Regius Professors of History (Cambridge)