Good quotes about History: Some of the best great quotes about History
Posterity: you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it. – John Quincy Adams
To live without having a Cicero and a Tacitus at hand seems to me as if it was aprivation of one of my limbs. – John Quincy Adams
Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit. – Henry B. Adams
History is the sum total of things that could have been avoided. – Konrad Adenauer
Be as a tower firmly set; Shakes not its top for any blast that blows. – Dante Alighieri
Open markets offer the only realistic hope of pulling billions of people in developing countries out of abject poverty, while sustaining prosperity in the industrialized world. – Kofi Annan
Failure is impossible. – Susan B. Anthony
That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. – Neil Armstrong
People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them. – James A. Baldwin
The past is malleable and flexible, changing as our recollection interprets and re-explains what has happened. – Peter Berger
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief… For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. – Wendell Berry
History is an account, mostly false, of events, mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools. – Ambrose Bierce
History is the great dust-heap… a pageant and not a philosophy. – Augustine Birrell
Libraries are not made, they grow. – Augustine Birrell
Friendship is a word, the very sight of which in print makes the heart warm. – Augustine Birrell
Given Pounds and five years, and an ordinary man can in the ordinary course, without any undue haste or putting any pressure upon his taste, surround himself with books, all in his own language, and thence forward have at least one place in the world. – Augustine Birrell
Is this true or only clever? – Augustine Birrell
An ordinary man can surround himself with two thousand books and thenceforward have at least one place in the world in which it is possible to be happy. – Augustine Birrell
That great dust-heap called ‘history’. – Augustine Birrell
In my view, far from deserving condemnation for their courageous reporting, the New York Times, the Washington Post and other newspapers should be commended for serving the purpose that the Founding Fathers saw so clearly. – Hugo Black
We, therefore, here in Britain stand shoulder to shoulder with our American friends in this hour of tragedy, and we, like them, will not rest until this evil is driven from our world. – Tony Blair
History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon. – Napoleon Bonaparte
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever. – Napoleon Bonaparte
What is history but a fable agreed upon? – Napoleon Bonaparte
Fear of serious injury alone cannot justify oppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burnt women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fears. – Louis D. Brandeis
Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done. – Louis D. Brandeis
The past actually happened but history is only what someone wrote down. – A. Whitney Brown
The deliberate and deadly attacks which were carried out yesterday against our country were more than acts of terror. They were acts of war. – George W. Bush
God cannot alter the past, though historians can. – Samuel Butler
I came, I saw, I conquered. – Julius Caesar
When you do the common things in life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world. – George Washington Carver
I began revolution with 82 men. If I had to do it again, I do it with 10 or 15 and absolute faith. It does not matter how small you are if you have faith and plan of action. – Fidel Castro
Something as curious as the monarchy won’t survive unless you take account of people’s attitudes. After all, if people don’t want it, they won’t have it. – Prince Charles
A light supper, a good night’s sleep, and a fine morning have often made a hero of the same man who by indigestion, a restless night, and a rainy morning, would have proved a coward. – Earl of Chesterfield
Terrorism takes us back to ages we thought were long gone if we allow it a free hand to corrupt democratic societies and destroy the basic rules of international life. – Jacques Chirac
The construction of Europe is an art. It is the art of the possible. – Jacques Chirac
History will be kind to me for I intend to write it. – Winston Churchill
A truly American sentiment recognizes the dignity of labor and the fact that honor lies in honest toil. – Grover Cleveland
Following the light of the sun, we left the Old World. – Christopher Columbus
Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. – Confucius
I have noticed that nothing I never said ever did me any harm. – Calvin Coolidge
History is a vast early warning system. – Norman Cousins
History is philosophy teaching by example. – Dionysius
Beware of endeavoring to become a great man in a hurry. One such attempt in ten thousand may succeed. These are fearful odds. – Benjamin Disraeli
One who comes to the Court must come to adore, not to protest. That’s the new gloss on the 1st Amendment. – William O. Douglas
Tell the FBI that the kidnappers should pick out a judge that Nixon wants back. – William O. Douglas
I wouldn’t attach too much importance to these student riots. I remember when I was a student at the Sorbonne in Paris, I used to go out and riot occasionally. – John Foster Dulles
The most terrible job in warfare is to be a second lieutenant leading a platoon when you are on the battlefield. – Dwight D. Eisenhower
The greater the difficulty, the more the glory in surmounting it. – Epicurus
History is more or less bunk. – Henry Ford
The three-martini lunch is the epitome of American efficiency. Where else can you get an earful, a bellyful and a snootful at the same time? – Gerald R. Ford
History never looks like history when you are living through it. – John W. Gardner
My dear and old country, here we are once again together faced with a heavy trial. – Charles de Gaulle
I have tried to lift France out of the mud. But she will return to her errors and vomitings. I cannot prevent the French from being French. – Charles de Gaulle
How can you be expected to govern a country that has 246 kinds of cheese? – Charles de Gaulle
History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind. – Edward Gibbon
We used to root for the Indians against the cavalry, because we didn’t think it was fair in the history books that when the cavalry won it was a great victory, and when the Indians won it was a massacre. – Dick Gregory
There are no extraordinary men… just extraordinary circumstances that ordinary men are forced to deal with. – William Halsey
Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty. – Frank Herbert
I’m the only person of distinction who has ever had a depression named for him. – Herbert Hoover
Honor is not the exclusive property of any political party. – Herbert Hoover
No greater nor more affectionate honor can be conferred on an American than to have a public school named after him. – Herbert Hoover
You can’t set a hen in one morning and have chicken salad for lunch. – George M. Humphrey
I cannot lead you into battle. I do not give you laws or administer justice but I can do something else – I can give my heart and my devotion to these old islands and to all the peoples of our brotherhood of nations. – Elizabeth II
It takes an endless amount of history to make even a little tradition. – Henry James
The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds. – William James
I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. – Thomas Jefferson
Being president is like being a jackass in a hailstorm. There’s nothing to do but to stand there and take it. – Lyndon B. Johnson
If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac River, the headline that afternoon would read: “President Can’t Swim.” – Lyndon B. Johnson
The Russians feared Ike. They didn’t fear me. – Lyndon B. Johnson
The field of combat was a long, narrow, green-baize covered table. The weapons were words. – C. Turner Joy
To the extent that the judicial profession becomes the daily routine of deciding cases on the most secure precedents and the narrowest grounds available, the judicial mind atrophies and its perspective shrinks. – Irving R. Kaufman
What most impresses us about great jurists is not their tenacious grasps of fine points, honed almost to invisibility; it is the moment when we are suddently aware of the sweep and direction of the law, and its place in the lives of men. – Irving R. Kaufman
The judicial system is the most expensive machine ever invented for finding out what happened and what to do about it. – Irving R. Kaufman
The Supreme Court’s only armor is the cloak of public trust; its sole ammunition, the collective hopes of our society. – Irving R. Kaufman
We would like to live as we once lived, but history will not permit it. – John F. Kennedy
History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside. – John F. Kennedy
If we cannot now end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. – John F. Kennedy
When written in Chinese, the word “crisis” is composed of two characters. One represents danger and the other represents opportunity. – John F. Kennedy
Page topic: Good quotes about History: Some of the best great quotes about History
