quotations about history
We cannot escape history.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
annual message, Dec. 1, 1862
The best history doesn't just sit behind a glass case; it helps us to understand what's outside the case.
BARACK OBAMA
remarks at the dedication of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C., September 24, 2016
More history is made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills and proclamations.
JOHN BARTH
attributed, Words from the Wise
The best history is but like the art of Rembrandt; it casts a vivid light on certain selected causes, on those which were best and greatest; it leaves all the rest in shadow and unseen.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
History allows us to see the obvious -- but unfortunately, not until it is too late.
BRIAN HERBERT & KEVIN J. ANDERSON
Dune: House Atreides
Psychology keeps trying to vindicate human nature. History keeps undermining the effort.
MASON COOLEY
City Aphorisms
History is a constant race between invention and catastrophe.
FRANK HERBERT
God Emperor of Dune
That's one of the central problems of history, isn't it, sir? The question of subjective versus objective interpretation, the fact that we need to know the history of the historian in order to understand the version that is being put in front of us.
JULIAN BARNES
The Sense of an Ending
Is the only lesson of history to be that mankind is unteachable?
WINSTON CHURCHILL
speech at Zurich University, Sep. 19, 1946
Great men are the inspired texts of that divine Book of Revelations, whereof a chapter is completed from epoch to epoch, and by some named History.
THOMAS CARLYLE
Sartor Resartus
Today is Yesterday's Pupil.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Poor Richard's Almanack, 1751
The facts of history have been too well rehearsed.
JOHN ASHBERY
"The System,", Three Poems
And history with all her volumes vast,
Hath but one page.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
GEORGE SANTAYANA
The Life of Reason
The very ink with which all history is written is merely fluid prejudice.
MARK TWAIN
Following the Equator
Men need history; it helps them to have an idea of who they are. But history, like sanctity, can reside in the heart; it is enough that there is something there.
V. S. NAIPAUL
The Enigma of Arrival
History is like a bloodstain that keeps on showing on the wall no matter how many new owners take possession, no matter how many times we paint over it.
PETER CAREY
attributed, Ghost Empire: How the French Almost Conquered North America
No matter how carefully records are kept and filed and computerized, they grow fuzzy with time. Stories grow by accretion. Tales accumulate--like dust. The longer the time lapse, the dustier the history--until it degenerates into fables.
ISAAC ASIMOV
Foundation's Edge
Human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives.
HOWARD ZINN
A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
History is a bath of blood.
WILLIAM JAMES
The Moral Equivalent of War