That’s the church historian, saying that the purpose of Church History is to convince people to believe in the church, not to provide history.
He then rebuts the History Purists who think history should tell its own story.
I’m a purist. Give me real history, rather than a sales pitch. I have little respect for marketing wolves in Historian clothing
“They [scholars] are of secondary importance to us”.
He also says the purpose of having scholars is to appear “Respectable, and have scholarly stature”
This is psuedo-science defined.