Quotes About History

between 1957 and 1990 there were more than 150 African heads of state and only six relinquished power voluntarily.

I have very carefully studied Islam and the life of its Prophet (PBUH). I have done so both as a student of history and as a critic. And I have come to conclusion that Muhammad (PBUH) was indeed a great man and a deliverer and benefactor of mankind which was till then writhing under the most agonising Pain.

If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience.

The novelties of one generation are only the resuscitated fashions of the generation before last.

But I will now go further, and confess to you that men get tired of everything, of heaven no less than of hell; and that all history is nothing but a record of the oscillations of the world between these two extremes. An epoch is but a swing of the pendulum; and each generation thinks the world is progressing because it is always moving.

In eighteenth century France the end was at hand when men bought the Encyclopedia and found Diderot there.

Think of how it all started: America was founded by slave owners who informed us, All men are created equal. All men, except Indians, niggers, and women. Remember, the founders were a small group of unelected, white, male, land-holding slave owners who also, by the way, suggested their class be the only one allowed to vote. To my mind, that is what's known as being stunningly--and embarrassingly--full of shit.

This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free.

Life is sacred? Who said so? God? Hey, if you read history, you realize that God is one of the leading causes of death! Has been for thousands of years! Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Christians; all taking turns killing each other because God told 'em it was a good idea.

The future will soon be a thing of the past.

Whatever happened to "In victory, magnanimity; in defeat, defiance." So said Frederick the Great.

I desire no future that will break the ties of the past.

Can anything be more disgusting than to hear people called 'educated' making small jokes about eating ham, and showing themselves empty of any real knowledge as to the relation of their own social and religious life to the history of the people they think themselves witty in insulting? [...] The best thing that can be said of it is, that it is a sign of the intellectual narrowness—in plain English, the stupidity which is still the average mark of our culture.

I beg your pardon: correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays. And the strongest slang of all is the slang of poets.

It is easy to say how we love new friends, and what we think of them, but words can never trace out all the fibers that knit us to the old.

But if Maggie had been that young lady, you would probably have known nothing about her: her life would have had so few vicissitudes that it could hardly have been written; for the happiest women, like the happiest nations, have no history.

No retrospect will take us to the true beginning

All choice of words is slang. It marks a class." "There is correct English: that is not slang." "I beg your pardon: correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays. And the strongest slang of all is the slang of poets.

Scenes which make vital changes in our neighbors' lot are but the background of our own, yet, like a particular aspect of the fields and trees, they become associated for us with the epochs of our own history, and make a part of that unity which lies in the selection of our keenest consciousness.

Our deeds still travel with us from afar, And what we have been makes us what we are

He had no ideal world of dead heroes; he knew little of the life of men in the past; he must find the beings to whom he could cling with loving admiration among those who came within speech of him.

Could there be a slenderer, more insignificant thread in human history than this consciousness of a girl, busy with her small inferences of the way in which she could make her life pleasant?

Are you beginning to dislike slang, then?" said Rosamond with mild gravity. "Only the wrong sort. All choice of words is slang. It marks a class." "There is correct English; that is not slang." "I beg your pardon; correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays. And the strongest slang of all is the slang of poets.

Men, like planets, have both a visible and invisible history.