Quotes About Perspective

when set in its proper historical context, the present time appears less unnervingly unprecedented and more familiar.

For some readers, I dare say, the word 'institution' still conjures up a Victorian vision of lunatic asylums: poor old Niall, he's in an institution now. That is not the kind of institution I mean. I am talking about, for example, political institutions, like the British Parliament or the American Congress. When we talk about

Niall Ferguson

The majority of books about World War I represent its causes as diplomatic, its course as military and its consequences as economic.

My generation feels like it's the lucky one,' she told me one night. 'Our grandparents had the Great Leap Forward, our parents had the Cultural Revolution. But we get to study, to travel, to make money. So I guess we really don't think that much about the Square thing.

how far history is distorted by the dubious benefit of hindsight.

There can be no understanding without that sympathy which puts us, through the imagination, and (another's) situation.

We must resist the temptation to romanticize history's losers.

It's because they don't understand good sex has nothing to do with equality.

Just as artists who draw landscapes get down in the valley to study the mountains and go up to the mountains to look down on the valley, so one has to be a prince to get to know the character of a people and a man of the people to know the character of a prince.

In the city of the blind, whoever has one eye is lord.

To understand the nature of the people one must be a prince, and to understand the nature of the prince, one must be of the people

Men in general are as much affected by what a thing appears to be as by what it is, indeed they are frequently influenced more by appearances than by reality.

Porque así como aquellos que dibujan se colocan abajo, en el llano, para considerar la naturaleza de los montes y de los lugares elevados y, para considerar la de los bajos, se colocan en lo alto, sobre los montes, igualmente para conocer bien la naturaleza de los pueblos, es necesario ser príncipe, y para conocer bien la de los príncipes, es necesario ser del pueblo.

so one has to be a prince to get to know the character of a people and a man of the people to know the character of a prince.

so in like manner to understand the People a man should be a Prince, and to have a clear notion of Princes he should belong to the People.

Nas?l manzara resmi yapanlar, daÄŸlar?n ve yüksek yerlerin yap?s?n? gözlemlemek için ovada alçak bir konumda duruyor ve alçak yerlerin yap?s?n? gözlemlemek için daÄŸlar?n tepesine ç?k?yorlarsa, ayn? ÅŸekilde, halklar?n yap?s?n? iyi tan?mak için prens olmak ve prenslerin yap?s?n? iyi tan?mak için de halktan birisi olmak gerekir.

Doctor, you say there are no haloes around the streetlights in Paris and what I see is an aberration caused by old age, an affliction. I tell you it has taken me all my life to arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels, to soften and blur and finally banish the edges you regret I don't see

to learn that the line I called the horizon does not exist and sky and water, so long apart, are the same state of being….

And I said well luckily I was mature and old enough to take this success at my age. It was bullshit.

I guess that's all forever is. One long trail of nows. And I guess all you can do is try and live one now at a time without getting too worked up about the last now or the next now

I guess that's all forever is," his father replied. "Just one long trail of nows. And I guess all you can do is try and live one now at a time without getting too worked up about the last now or the next now.

For Josef, the goal of art was to reveal new ways of seeing, "to open eyes.

I like it when it's sunny, when it rains, when it snows. I like it when it gets dark early, when it stays light late. There's something beautiful about every moment of every day. All you have to do is make the decision to see the positive, to filter the world.