Quotes About History

Time is the architect, the nation is the builder.

Shall we weep for all the innocent, all martyrs, all children, the lowly as well as the exalted? I agree to that. But in that case, as I have told you, we must go back further than '93, and our tears must begin before Louis XVII. I will weep with you over the children of kings, provided that you will weep with me over the children of the people.

What is Waterloo? A victory? No. The winning number in the lottery.

Yes, the brutalities of progress are called revolutions. When they are over, men recognize that the human race has been harshly treated but that it has moved forward.

That light called history is pitiless; it possesses this peculiar and divine quality, that, pure light as it is, and precisely because it is wholly light, it often casts a shadow in places where people had hitherto beheld rays; from the same man it constructs two different phantoms, and the one attacks the other and executes justice on it, and the shadows of the despot contend with the brilliancy of the leader.

Les amis de l'abc... a group which barely missed becoming historic

Mais où sont les neiges d'antan? But where are the snows of years gone by?

All the invasions of history have been determined by petticoats.

he beheld the grand figure of the people emerge from the Revolution, and the grand figure of France spring forth from the Empire. He asserted in his conscience, that all this had been good. What

The counterfeits of the past assume false names, and gladly call themselves the future.

History neglects nearly all these particulars, and cannot do otherwise; the infinity would overwhelm it. Nevertheless, these details, which are wrongly called trivial,—there are no trivial facts in humanity, nor little leaves in vegetation,—are useful.

There has come into fashion a strange and easy manner of suppressing the revelations of history, of invalidating the commentaries of philosophy, of eliding all embarrassing facts and all gloomy questions.

Todavía perdura este patio la tormenta del combate; es visible el espanto; las convulsiones de la refriega se han quedado petrificadas en ese lugar; los seres están vivos, y luego muertos; fue ayer. Las paredes agonizan, las piedras se caen, las brechas vocean; los agujeros son llagas; los árboles inclinados y estremecidos parecen esforzarse por escapar.

It is the features of the years that makes up the face of the century.

If he had had Peru in his pocket he would certainly have given it to the dancer, but Gringoire had no Peru there, and, besides, America was not yet discovered.

In the early ages, the social edifice rested on three columns, the priest, the king and the headsman. It is a long time since a voice exclaimed, "The gods have departed!" Lately another voice has cried, "The kings have departed!" It is now full time that a third voice shall be raised to say, "The executioner must go!

As revoluções nascem, não de um acidente, mas da necessidade. Ela existe porque é preciso que ela exista.

Desconfiemos. El pasado tiene un rostro : la superstición, y una máscara : la hipocresía. Denunciemos el rostro y arranquemos la máscara.

This clarity, history, is unforgiving. What is strange about it is that, though it brings light, and precisely because it brings light, it often casts a shadow in the places where brightness used to be seen

La historia de las ciudades se refleja en sus cloacas.

This is what floats up confusedly, pell-mell, for the year 1817, and is now forgotten. History neglects nearly all these particulars, and cannot do otherwise; the infinity would overwhelm it.

The social edifice of the past rests on three columns,—the priest, the king, and the hangman.

It is the lineaments of the years which form the countenance of the century.

This is what floats up confusedly, pell-mell, for the year 1817, and is now forgotten. History neglects nearly all these particulars, and cannot do otherwise; the infinity would overwhelm it. Nevertheless, these details, which are wrongly called trivial,—there are no trivial facts in humanity, nor little leaves in vegetation,—are useful. It is of the physiognomy of the years that the physiognomy of the centuries is composed.