Quotes About History

Molte cose furono allora fra noi dette e fatte; ma di queste è bene che non resti memoria.

Si comprender es imposible, conocer es necesario, porque lo sucedido puede volver a suceder, las conciencias pueden ser seducidas y obnubiladas de nuevo: las nuestras también

Quien quema libros termina tarde o temprano por quemar hombres - Heinrich Heine

Ich glaube, in den Schrecken des Dritten Reichs ein einzigartiges, exemplarisches, symbolisches Geschehen zu erkennen, dessen Bedeutung allerdings noch nicht erhellt wurde: die Vorankündigung einer noch größeren Katastrophe, die über der ganzen Menschheit schwebt und nur dann abgewendet werden kann, wenn wir alle es wirklich fertigbringen, Vergangenes zu begreifen, Drohendes zu bannen.

Riferito ai Muselmänner] Essi popolano la mia memoria della loro presenza senza volte, e se potessi racchiudere in un'immagine tutto il male del nostro tempo, sceglierei questa immagine, che mi è familiare: un uomo scarno, dalla fronte china e dalle spalle curve, sul cui volto o nei cui occhi non si posso leggere traccia di pensiero. Se i sommersi non hanno storia, e una sola e ampia è la via della perdizione, le vie della salvazione sono invece molte, aspre ed impensate.

Auschwitz: un nombre carente de cualquier significado entonces para nosotros pero que tenía que corresponder a un lugar de este mundo.

L'histoire n'était pas une tache de sauce soja aisément essuyée par une serviette rose dans la main d'une jolie jeune fille comme celle qui le conduisait à présent à sa table, près de la grande porte-fenêtre.

Tant d'histoire, dit le duc d'Auge au duc d'Auge, tant d'histoire pour quelques calembours, pour quelques anachronismes! Je trouve cela misérable. On n'en sortira donc jamais?

Tant d'histoire, dit le duc d'Auge au duc d'Auge, tant d'histoire por quelques calembours, pour quelques anachronismes! Je trouve cela misérable. On n'en sortira donc jamais?

The persecution of Christians has always been a sign that the Catholic Church was the true Church founded by Christ

One cannot raise walls against what has been forgotten.

Only madmen and historians, he said, believe their lies.

That hope is little more than the premonition of regret. This is the first lesson of history.

Power does not make safe. History murders the children of weak rulers.

Given the manifest frailty of men, given the long succession of delusions that was their history, what could be more preposterous than claiming oneself the least deluded, let alone privy to the absolute?

For Nautzera there was no present, only the clamour of a harrowing past and the threat of a corresponding future. For Nautzera, the present had receded to a point, had become the precarious fulcrum whereby history leveraged destiny. A mere formality.

One cannot raise walls against what has been forgotten. Heartbroken

History has never been dominated by majorities, but only by dedicated minorities who stand unconditionally on their faith.

Always remember the words of Descartes: The reading of all good books is like conversion with the finest men of the past centuries.

But the past never leaves us. It's in every breath, every cell, every second. I know that now.

The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of the past centuries.

A blank isn't the same. He remembered holding the book, feeling the history of the leather cover someone had tanned and stretched and cut to fit. The paper that someone had laboriously filled by hand and sewn into the binding. Years, heavy on the pages. Morgan had been reading a copy of it. An original. It felt like the old monk's story was part of his own. But when he read it in the blank, it was just words, and it had no power to carry him away.

Mortals simply aren't what they used to be, he said. A thousand years ago, you would have bartered your immortal soul for a crust of stale bread. Now I can't even get you to gamble at all, even for your freedom.

What we have is real love, but real love is messy and complicated. How can it not be, with our history?