To believe that what has not occurred in history will not occur at all, is to argue disbelief in the dignity of man.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
History is the distillation of rumor.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
History is an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
It is humiliating to remain with our hands folded while others write history. It matters little who wins. To make a people great it is necessary to send them to battle even if you have to kick them in the pants. That is what I shall do.
—Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) Italian Head of State, Politician
God cannot alter the past, that is why he is obliged to connive at the existence of historians.
—Samuel Butler
Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician, Essayist
The main thing is to make history, not to write it.
—Otto von Bismarck (1815–98) German Chancellor, Prime Minister
Until the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter.
—African Proverb
While we read history we make history.
—George William Curtis (1824–92) American Essayist, Public Speaker, Editor, Author
It does seem so pleasant to talk with an old acquaintance who knows what you know. I see so many new folks nowadays who seem to have neither past nor future. Conversation has got to have some root in the past, or else you have got to explain every remark you make, and it wears a person out.
—Sarah Orne Jewett (1849–1909) American Children’s Books Writer, Novelist, Short Story Writer
What experience and history teach is this — that nations and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) German Philosopher
Human history in essence is the history of ideas.
—H. G. Wells (1866–1946) English Novelist, Historian, Social Thinker
History is strewn thick with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill, but a lie, well told, is immortal.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
Indeed, history is nothing more than a tableau of crimes and misfortunes.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
Ignorance is the first requisite of the historian—ignorance, which simplifies and clarifies, which selects and omits, with a placid perfection unattainable by the highest art.
—Lytton Strachey (1880–1932) British Biographer, Essayist
Historians desiring to write the actions of men, ought to set down the simple truth, and not say anything for love or hatred; also to choose such an opportunity for writing as it may be lawful to think what they will, and write what they think, which is a rare happiness of the time.
—Walter Raleigh (1552–1618) English Courtier, Navigator, Poet
Historian—an unsuccessful novelist.
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself.
—Winston Churchill (1874–1965) British Head of State, Political leader, Historian, Journalist, Author
Every time history repeats itself the price goes up.
—Unknown
We ought not to look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dear-bought experience.
—George Washington (1732–99) American Head of State, Military Leader
History is always written wrong, and so always needs to be rewritten.
—George Santayana (1863–1952) Spanish-American Poet, Philosopher
To be ignorant of the lives of the most celebrated men of antiquity is to continue in a state of childhood.
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
History is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play upon the dead.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
Great abilities are not requisite for an Historian; for in historical composition, all the greatest powers of the human mind are quiescent. He has facts ready to his hand; so there is no exercise of invention. Imagination is not required in any degree; only about as much as is used in the lowest kinds of poetry. Some penetration, accuracy, and coloring, will fit a man for the task, if he can give the application which is necessary.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
What is all our histories, but God showing himself, shaking and trampling on everything that he has not planted.
—Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658) British Head of State, Military Leader
History is little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
—Edward Gibbon (1737–94) English Historian, Politician
Anybody can make history. Only a great man can write it.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Caesar had perished from the world of men, had not his sword been rescued by his pen.
—Henry Vaughan (1621–95) Anglo-Welsh Metaphysical Poet
The men who make history have not time to write it.
—Klemens Wenzel, Prince von Metternich (1773–1859) Austrian Political leader, Politician
To give an accurate and exhaustive account of that period would need a far less brilliant pen than mine.
—Max Beerbohm (1872–1956) British Essayist, Caricaturist, Novelist
Our ignorance of history causes us to slander our own times.
—Gustave Flaubert (1821–80) French Novelist, Playwright, Short Story Writer
In our wildest aberrations we dream of an equilibrium we have left behind and which we naively expect to find at the end of our errors. Childish presumption which justifies the fact that child-nations, inheriting our follies, are now directing our history.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Essayist, Novelist, Author
Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. Weeven we herehold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free—honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best, hope of earth.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
It’s clear that something must be done about the effectively disruptive tactics of anarchistic handfuls (at political rallies). Handling the occasional heckler is a storied, valuable art in politics; but a militant group of grubs (have) announced their determination to rape the right of candidates to be heard and of citizens to hear. Far, far too often these stinky finkies succeeded…. Free speech is the first requisite of freedom and a viable, functioning democracy. The exercise of it cannot be at the option of those who think the right to dissent includes the right to destroy.
—Malcolm S. Forbes (1919–1990) American Publisher, Businessperson
Historians are prophets with their face turned backward.
—Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) German Poet, Dramatist
Fable is more historical than fact, because fact tells us about one man and fable tells us about a million men.
—G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English Journalist, Novelist, Essayist, Poet
The pyramids, attached with age, have forgotten the names of their founders.
—Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American Inventor, Philosopher
Providence conceals itself in the details of human affairs, but becomes unveiled in the generalities of history.
—Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869) French Poet, Politician, Historian
The first duty of an historian is to be on guard against his own sympathies.
—James Anthony Froude (1818–94) British Historian, Novelist, Biographer, Editor
From the heights of these pyramids, forty centuries look down on us.
—Napoleon I (1769–1821) Emperor of France
History repeats itself. That’s one of the things wrong with history.
—Common Proverb
History is the devil’s scripture.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
History is but a confused heap of facts.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
To give an accurate description of what has never occurred is not merely the proper occupation of the historian, but the inalienable privilege of any man of parts and culture.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
I love those historians that are either very simple or most excellent. Such as are between both (which is the most common fashion), it is they that spoil all; they will needs chew our meat for us and take upon them a law to judge, and by consequence to square and incline the story according to their fantasy.
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–92) French Essayist
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say.
—William C. Durant (1861–1947) American Industrialist
History, is made up of the bad actions of extraordinary men and woman. All the most noted destroyers and deceivers of our species, all the founders of arbitrary governments and false religions have been extraordinary people; and nine tenths of the calamities that have befallen the human race had no other origin than the union of high intelligence with low desires.
—Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay (1800–59) English Historian, Essayist, Philanthropist
You treat world history as a mathematician does mathematics, in which nothing but laws and formulas exist, no reality, no good and evil, no time, no yesterday, no tomorrow, nothing but an eternal, shallow, mathematical present.
—Hermann Hesse (1877–1962) German-born Swiss Novelist, Poet
The historian must have some conception of how men who are not historians behave. Otherwise he will move in a world of the dead. He can only gain that conception through personal experience, and he can only use his personal experiences when he is a genius.
—E. M. Forster (1879–1970) English Novelist, Short Story Writer, Essayist
Historian. A broad—gauge gossip.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist