Historical Quotes
  
  
  
	
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		It is easy to see, though it scarcely needs to be pointed out, since it is involved in the fact that Reason is set aside, that faith is not a form of knowledge; for all knowledge is either a knowledge of the eternal, excluding the temporal and historical as indifferent, or it is pure historical knowledge. No knowledge can have for its object the absurdity that the eternal is the historical.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Soren Kierkegaard
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		It is possible to express the laws of thermodynamics in the form of independent principles , deduced by induction from the facts of observation and experiment, without reference to any hypothesis as to the occult molecular operations with which the sensible phenomena may be conceived to be connected; and that course will be followed in the body of the present treatise. But, in giving a brief historical sketch of the progress of thermodynamics, the progress of the hypothesis of thermic molecular motions cannot be wholly separated from that of the purely inductive theory.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				William John Macquorn Rankine
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		before one actually visits them, everyone tends to think of their favorite countries as one grand Disneyland filled with national monuments and historical treasures conveniently laid out for easy viewing, when what they really are filled with, of course, is people going to work, laundromats and places to buy rat poison.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Bette Midler
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Fiction has consisted either of placing imaginary characters in a true story, which is the Iliad, or of presenting the story of an individual as having a general historical value, which is the Odyssey.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Raymond Queneau
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		I am not taking away the historical legacy, but it should not become a burden.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Asghar Ali Engineer
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Roger Casement is an intriguing figure - humanitarian, Irish revolutionary, gay - and much had and would be written about him, there was something about his character as a conflicted man, an Irish Protestant who spent much of his time representing England in different African nations, a gay man who, true to the times, kept his sexual orientation to himself, that kept playing in my head. I read on and around him, but a historical figure is not a story - it's not even a character - so my story, the one that I would develop into Valiant Gentlemen, had yet to reveal itself.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Sabina Murray
			
		
	
	
  
	 
	
		
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		As an historical novelist - there are few jobs more retrospective.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Sara Sheridan
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Historical awareness is a kind of resurrection.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				William Lewis Trogdon
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can throw the rascals out at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy. Then it should be possible to replace it, every four years if necessary, by the other party, which will be none of these things but will still pursue, with new vigor, approximately the same basic policies.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Carroll Quigley
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		My inspiration for interior design is more historical than traditional.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Patrick Cox
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		The Mexican people are increasingly middle class, and Mexico has substantially become a middle-class society. This is true despite the significant poverty, and the class and geographic inequality that have deep historical roots.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Alan Bersin
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		The 'inquests' which resulted in the compilation of the Domesday Book made a vivid and unfavorable impression on the country. A similar effect was produced by the inquests of 1166 and 1170, before alluded to. Even to this day, the word 'inquisitorial' bears the burden of historical unpopularity.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Edward Jenks
			
		
	
	
  
	 
	
		
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		I learned that victims come in all image - some raped, some witnessing an act of violence, some losing loved ones. I learned that the solutions come by both listening to the people impacted by the crisis and by learning from historical experiences in other places.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Zainab Salbi
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Our schools have been scientifically designed to prevent over-education from happening. The average American [should be] content with their humble role in life, because they're not tempted to think about any other role.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				William Torrey Harris
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		I think a lot of my interest in history now isn't so much in places and names and texts and public figures, but more in examining all the nuances and idiosyncrasies of particular stories of everyday people. And if that doesn't happen, then I usually transplant myself and my own stories to a particular historical event. Which is why you'll see me, the first person pronoun, interacting in a song about Carl Sandburg, or you'll find my [sic] interacting with Saul Bellow. It's sort of a re-rendering of history and making it my own.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Sufjan Stevens
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		We are giving away the country so a few very rich people can get richer.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Virgil Goode
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back to bondage.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Alexander Fraser Tytler
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		A notion for a story is for me a confluence of real events, historical perhaps, or from my own memory to create an exciting fusion.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Michael Morpurgo
			
		
	
	
  
	 
	
		
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		I strongly reject threats by any member state to destroy another or outrageous attempts to deny historical facts such as the Holocaust.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Ban Ki-moon
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Many novelists take well-defined, precise characters, whose stories are sometimes of mediocre interest, and place them in an important historical context, which remains secondary in spite of everything.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Raymond Queneau
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		The material world constrain us, often with gret beneficence, to see each person and thing in its time and place, its historical context. But mental life doesn't so constrain us. It is porous, open to air and light, swings forward while swaying back, scatters its stripes in all directions, and delights to find itself beached beside something invented only that morning or instead standing beside an altar from three millennia ago.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				Elaine Scarry
			
		
	
	
  
	 
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		Today the path of total dictatorship in the United States can be laid by strictly legal means, unseen and unheard by the Congress, the President, or the people. Outwardly we have a Constitutional government. We have operating within our government and political system, another body representing another form of government - a bureaucratic elite.
	
	
	
		
			
				
					
						
					
				
				William E. Jenner