Quotes About History

During the thousand years of her history Russia had seen many great things. During the Soviet period the country had seen global military victories, vast construction sites, whole new cities, dams across the Dnieper and the Volga, canals joining different seas. The country had seen mighty tractors and skyscrapers...There was only one thing Russia had not seen during this thousand years: freedom.

Chi scrive ha il dovere di raccontare una verità tremenda, e chi legge ha il dovere civile di conoscerla, questa verità. Chiunque giri le spalle, chiuda gli occhi o passi oltre offende la memoria dei caduti.

Oggi come oggi ogni singolo uomo è tenuto, dinanzi alla sua coscienza, a suo figlio e a sua madre, dinanzi alla patria e al genere umano a rispondere con tutta la forza del cuore e della mente a una domanda: che cosa ha generato il razzismo? Che cosa bisogna fare affinché il nazismo, il fascismo, l'hitlerismo non abbiano a risorgere né al di qua né al di là dell'oceano, mai e poi mai, in secula seculorum?

How many people there were like him – forgotten during unforgettable years.

The country had seen mighty tractors and skyscrapers...There was only one thing Russia had not seen during this thousand years: freedom.

And there had even been room in his head for the rustling of leaves, the light of the moon, millet porridge with milk, the sound of flames in the stove, snatches of tunes, the barking of dogs, the Roman Senate, Soviet Information Bureau bulletins, a hatred of slavery, and a love of melon seeds.

Denna styrka hos den statliga nationalismen och denna vettlösa nationalism hos de människor som berövats frihet och människovärde blev till den nya ordningens förnämsta drivkraft, dess kärnstridsspets, och blev bestämmande för 1900-talets hela ödeslopp.

La luce della sera svela la natura profonda delle cose, trasforma l'impressione visiva in un quadro, la rende storia, sentimento, destino. Con il sole al tramonto, le macchie di fango e di fuliggine hanno mille voci, il cuore sussulta e tu hai di fronte felicità ormai perdute, lutti che non possono essere colmati, errori amari e la malìa eterna della speranza.

Fue así, con una cadena milenaria, como el progreso ruso y la esclavitud rusa estaban ligados el uno al otro. Cada escalada hacia la luz ahondaba aún más el negro foso de la esclavitud.

Para ello [Lenin] lo sacrificó todo; para alcanzar el poder inmoló, mató lo más sagrado que Rusia poseía: la libertad. Pero ¿qué experiencia podía tener la libertad, una criatura de sólo ocho meses, nacida en un país de esclavitud milenaria?

I keep thinking about Marcus Garvey and what he says about black people knowing themselves. It's clear that if the so-called Negro goes to school, he earns a degree for knowing the white man, but not for knowing himself . All he learns about himself is slavery. Slavery is not a history of a man; it's a misfortune of a race of people. The black man needs to know the dignity of our race. The only way he will get this knowledge is to take it for himself.

In those days, leaving the old behind in times of starvation was not an unknown act, although in this band it was happening for the first time.

the migrating bands in these times preserved hot coals in hardened mooseskin sacks or birchbark containers filled with ash in which the embers pulsated, ready to spark the next campfire.

any data more than a week old is history and is not useful for making the fast decisions necessitated by our highly connected global economy.

Military history is just as often the tangential story of an appeasement that fails to head off warmongering as it is of an aggressive chest-thumping that prompts conflict. The destructive military careers of Alexander the Great, Caesar, Napoleon, and Hitler all would have ended earlier had any of their numerous enemies united when the odds favored them, had any listened to a Demosthenes, a Cato the Younger, or a Churchill.

Harry Truman, after all, in conjunction with Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson, radically cut back American arms following the end of the Second World War. Johnson himself wished to dismantle the Marine Corps and felt nuclear weapons had made all such conventional arms unnecessary.

tragedy, comedy, and the Parthenon were not so much expressions of native genius as reflections of lots of money.

saw rearming as reactionary and coming at the expense of achieving social justice.

Victor Davis Hanson

History also is mostly the story of noncitizenship.

Let us study things that are no more. It is necessary to understand them, if only to avoid them.

England has two books, the Bible and Shakespeare. England made Shakespeare,but the Bible made England.

He who contemplates the depths of Paris is seized with vertigo. Nothing is more fantastic. Nothing is more tragic. Nothing is more sublime.

Yes, the brutalities of progress are called revolutions. When they are over, this is recognised: that the human race has been harshly treated, but that it has advanced.