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Truth is the only merit that gives dignity and worth to history.
LORD ACTON, The History of Freedom in Antiquity
What dependence can I have on the alleged events of ancient history, when I find such difficulty in ascertaining the truth regarding a matter that has taken place only a few minutes ago, and almost in my own presence!
SIR WALTER RALEIGH, attributed, Testimony: Its Posture in the Scientific World (Chambers, 1859)
ADVICE TO PERSONS ABOUT TO WRITE HISTORY -- DON'T.
LORD ACTON, postscript of letter to Mandell Creighton, Apr. 5, 1887
The inflexible integrity of the moral code is, to me, the secret of the authority, the dignity, the utility of History. If we may debase the currency for the sake of genius, or success, or rank, or reputation, we may debase it for the sake of a man’s influence, of his religion, of his party, of the good cause which prospers by his credit and suffers by his disgrace. Then History ceases to be a science, an arbiter of controversy, a guide of the Wanderer, the upholder of that moral standard which the powers of earth and religion itself tend constantly to depress. It serves where it ought to reign; and it serves the worst cause better than the purest.
LORD ACTON, letter to Mandell Creighton, Apr. 5, 1887
What is a great man who has made his mark upon history? Every time, if we think far enough, he is a man who has looked through the confusion of the moment and has seen the moral issue involved; he is a man who has refused to have his sense of justice distorted; he has listened to his conscience until conscience becomes a trumpet call to like-minded men, so that they gather about him, and together, with mutual purpose and mutual aid, they make a new period in history.
JANE ADDAMS, address to the Union League Club of Chicago, Feb. 23, 1903
History is the same thing over and over again.
WOODY ALLEN, interview, Der Spiegel, Jun. 20, 2005
I long for the time when all the human history is taught as one history, because it really is one history.
MAYA ANGELOU, Facebook post, Feb. 28, 2013
Poetry is written with tears, fiction with blood, and history with invisible ink.
CARLOS RUIZ ZAFON, The Angel's Game
On the breast of that huge Mississippi of falsehood called History, a foam-bell more or less is no consequence.
MATTHEW ARNOLD, "Literary Influence of Academies", Essays in Criticism, First Series
There are no happy endings in history, only crisis points that pass.
ISAAC ASIMOV, The Gods Themselves
The people, and the people alone, are the motive force in the making of world history.
MAO ZEDONG, "On Coalition Government", Apr. 24, 1945
Of all our studies, history is best qualified to reward our research. And when you see that you've got problems, all you have to do is examine the historic method used all over the world by others who have problems similar to yours. And once you see how they got theirs straight, then you know how you can get yours straight.
MALCOLM X, Message to the Grass Roots, Nov. 10, 1963
All you have learned from history is old ways of making mistakes. There is nothing that history can tell you about what we must do tomorrow. Only what we must not do.
EDWIN H. LAND, address to Polaroid Corporation employees at Symphony Hall in Boston, Massachusetts, February 5, 1960
People are absolutely haunted by [history]. You can see it at the swap meets.
PAMELA LANSDEN, "It's Monterey, Jack", Los Angeles Times, April 7, 1997
Construed as a means instead of an end, history is the weapon with which we defend the future against the past.
LEWIS H. LAPHAM, Lapham's Quarterly, 2008
Sometimes ... history needs a push.
VLADIMIR LENIN, attributed, Seeds of Revolution: A Collection of Axioms, Passages and Proverbs
The history of the race is but that of the individual "writ large".
GEORGE HENRY LEWES, The Foundations of a Creed
History. It has always vaguely interested him, that sinister mulch of facts our little lives grow out of before joining the mulch themselves, the fragile brown rotting layers of previous deaths.
JOHN UPDIKE, Rabbit at Rest
Men are not the causers of history. History itself, by a pressure of events, causes men to resort to particular actions.
TANITH LEE, The Gods are Thirsty
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