Quotes & Sayings About Good History

I just want to make sure I'm contributing good films to movie history rather than being famous just to be famous. — Logan Lerman

There's a good reason why nobody studies history, it just teaches you too much. — Noam Chomsky

I don't think there's any deep psychological reason. It isn't comparable, say, to America's involvement with Vietnam and the emotional scars that that has left behind. A much more cogent way of looking at it is that the British have suddenly realized that they have their own equivalent of the perennial western. We have an immense, extremely colorful, diverse history of the empire, and I think people are just beginning to realize that there are jolly good stories there for the telling. — Valerie Fitzgerald

The assumption that everything past is preserved holds good even in mental life only on condition that the organ of the mind has remained intact and that its tissues have not been damaged by trauma or inflammation. But destructive influences which can be compared to causes of illness like these are never lacking in the history of a city, even if it has had a less chequered past than Rome, and even if, like London, it has hardly ever suffered from the visitations of an enemy. — Sigmund Freud

[O]ne has to have endured a few decades before wanting, let alone needing, to embark on the project of recovering lost life. And I think it may be possible to review 'the chronicles of wasted time.' William Morris wrote in The Dream of John Ball that men fight for things and then lose the battle, only to win it again in a shape and form that they had not expected, and then be compelled again to defend it under another name. We are all of us very good at self-persuasion and I strive to be alert to its traps, but a version of what Hegel called 'the cunning of history' is a parallel commentary that I fight to keep alive in my mind. — Christopher Hitchens

But despite the scarcity of confrontation with whites in our neighborhood, race and racism permeated every aspect of our lives. Our parents taught us that in order to succeed, we 'had to be twice as good as white folks.' We were constantly being prepared to enter a world dominated by whites. — Junius Williams

It is full of interest, it has noble poetry in it and some clever fables and some blood drenched history, some good morals and a wealth of obscenity and upwards of a thousand lies.
(Re The Bible) — Mark Twain

There was more than one way to think about Mike Burry's purchase of a billion dollars in credit default swaps. The first was as a simple, even innocent, insurance contract. Burry made his semiannual premium payments and, in return, received protection against the default of a billion dollars' worth of bonds. He'd either be paid zero, if the triple-B-rated bonds he'd insured proved good, or a billion dollars, if those triple-B-rated bonds went bad. But of course Mike Burry didn't own any triple-B-rated subprime mortgage bonds, or anything like them. He had no property to "insure" it was as if he had bought fire insurance on some slum with a history of burning down. To him, as to Steve Eisman, a credit default swap wasn't insurance at all but an outright speculative bet against the market - and this was the second way to think about it. — Michael Lewis

Jewish history has been tragic to the Jews and no less tragic to the neighboring nations who have suffered them. Our major vice of old as of today is parasitism. We are a people of vultures living on the labor and good fortune of the rest of the world. — Samuel Roth

That was when I realized we weren't born to be
slaves. It was ignorant for any man to think he could be the master of another. We were all meant to be free, and somewhere there were good people helping to heal this broken world. — Jay Grewal

Words like "Society" and "State" are so concretized that they are almost personified. In the opinion of the man in the street, the "State," far more than any king in history, is the inexhaustible giver of all good; the "State" is invoked, made responsible, grumbled at, and so on and so forth. Society is elevated to the rank of a supreme ethical principle; indeed, it is even credited with positively creative capacities. — C. G. Jung

Any good history begins in strangeness. The past should not be comfortable. The past should not a familar echo of the present, for if it is familar why revist it? The past should be so strange that you wonder how you and people you know and love could come from such a time. — Richard White

In the history of life, no good news has followed that sentence ["We have to talk."]. — Paul Reiser

The Islamic conquest of India is probably the bloodiest story in history. It is a discouraging tale, for its evident moral is that civilization is a precious good, whose delicate complex of order and freedom, culture and peace, can at any moment be overthrown by barbarians invading from without or multiplying within. — Will Durant

The people are a story that never ends,
A river that winds and falls and gleams erect in many dawns;
Lost in deep gulleys, it turns to dust, rushes in the spring freshet,
Emerges to the sea. The people are a story that is a long incessant
Coming alive from the earth in better wheat, Percherons,
Babies, and engines, persistent and inevitable.
The people always know that some of the grain will be good,
Some of the crop will be saved, some will return and
Bear the strength of the kernel, that from the bloodiest year
Some survive to outfox the frost. — Meridel Le Sueur

I feel very privileged Williams has selected me as one of their race drivers. The team has great heritage and I hope I can help write a good chapter in their history. — Bruno Senna

Life is worth living and no matter what it throws at you it is important to keep your eyes on the prize of the happiness that will come. Even when the Death Railway reduced us to little more than animals, humanity in the shape of our saintly medical officers triumphed over barbarism.
Remember, while it always seems darkest before the dawn, perseverance pays off and the good times will return. — Alistair Urquhart

I was always told that I was good in mathematics, and I guess my grades and standardized test scores supported that. My worst subjects were those that generally involved a lot of reading - English and history. So, having good test scores in math and mediocre ones in reading, I was naturally advised to major in engineering in college. — Henry Petroski

In 1914, Franz Ferdinand, the Austrian imperial heir, was shot and killed by a Serbian nationalist in Sarajevo. Do you know the motive behind the act?
It was in retaliation for the subjugation of the Sebs in Austria.
It was not.Franz Ferdinand had stated his intention to introduce reforms favorable to the Serbs in his empire. Had he survived to ascend the throne, he would have made a revolution unnecessary. In plain terms, he was killed because he was going to give the rebels what they were shouting for. They needed a despot in the palace in order to seize it.
What's good for reform is bad for the reformers — Loren D. Estleman

The expression 'there is nothing like the good old days' does not mean that fewer bad things happened before, but fortunately, that people tend to forget about them. — Ernesto Sabato

The male clerk with his quill pen and copper-plate handwriting had gone for good. The female short-hand typist took his place. It was a decisive moment in women's emancipation. — A.J.P. Taylor

If you're looking for good Mexican food in Vegas, you go to the Arts District. Jonesing for stupidly overpriced jeans or a rhine- stone T-shirt? The Fashion Show Mall has you covered. How about some quiet contemplation over that lost trust fund? Lake Mead's your man. Maybe getting stabbed, shot, or beaten to death is your thing, so head on up to North Vegas. But, if you're looking for a snapshot of city history, a reasonably affordable libation, and the rare sensation of getting squeezed through a kaleidoscope's poop chute, then you can't beat Fremont. — Daniel Younger

Gregor grinned. "Congratulations to you, too, Miles. Your father before you needed a whole army to do it, but you've changed Barrayaran history just with a dinner invitation." Miles shrugged helplessly. God, is everybody going to blame me for this? And for everything that follows? "Let's try to avoid making history on this one, eh? I think we should push for unalleviated domestic dullness." "With all my heart," Gregor agreed. With a cheery salute, he cut the com. Miles laid his head down on the table, and moaned. "It's not my fault!" "Yes, it is," said Ivan. "It was all your idea. I was there when you came up with it." "No, it wasn't. It was yours. You're the one who dragooned me into attending the damned state dinner in the first place." "I only invited you. You invited Galeni. And anyway, my mother dragooned me." "Oh. So it's all her fault. Good. I can live with that." Ivan — Lois McMaster Bujold

Good writing is almost the concomitant of good history. Literature and history were joined long since by the powers which shaped the human brain; we cannot put them asunder. — C.V. Wedgwood

... walk in the footprints of his ancestors. This land is a museum of man's ancient history. The American has gone to the moon and found dust, he's going farther away to look for other planets, very good. But know thyself first. That is what I would tell my American friend. — Tsegaye Gebre Medhin

The past is what nourishes and sustains us. It is like going to work on a good breakfast. — Robert Stephen Parry

But you have to understand, my beard is so nasty. I mean, it's the only beard in the history of Western civilization that makes Bob Dylan's beard look good. — Bill Walton

[A]s military history reveals, a bad plan is often better than no plan, especially if the people on the other side think it's a good plan. — Adam Gopnik

Few stories are written about what happens to the princess after the wedding. Reading between the lines of other stories, we can sketch out her "happily ever after": The princess gets pregnant and hopes for sons. As long as she is faithful and bears sons, she is considered to be a good wife. We don't hear whether or not she's a good mother, unless something goes wrong with her children ... All of history has been written about the subsequent adventures in the chapters of his life. — Elizabeth Debold

I'm quite proud of growing up in New Zealand where, from quite early on in primary school, you're learning to count in Maori, Maori mythology and dances and colours and history, and I think that gives a child a really good grounding. — Martin Henderson

The races are like America's children. White people are the firstborn, so they were Dad's favorite. Black people are the second kids, the abused ones, so they still hate Dad. Latinos are the third, caught in the middle and always trying to make peace between the other siblings. Asians are the youngest, and get good marks in school, but basically are just trying to keep their heads down and not get involved. And Native Americans are the old uncle who owns a house and everyone else in the family was like, "He's not using that! Let's move in! — Colin Quinn

We have become the revisionist society. We rewrite history in favor of viewpoints. We rewrite ethics in favor of "what's right is what makes you feel good after." Political correctness puts Jesus and Buddha on the same low shelf. Gender inclusivity has us tied up in proper pronouns. Since God goes undefined, His expectations have been missing for some time, and sin is what you do that hurts others. — Calvin Miller

You can never underestimate the prince, I'm always there. The prince will never die. I ain't bragging, but I ain't seen nobody, and I mean nobody, come to the ring in such style, with such flair, charisma, I'm talking about bringing it all, a full package. I mean who would you know that could come out in a flying carpet. Come out like a concert, dancing, with like, oozing confidence, and then get in and take somebody out. Come on, do you know anybody in the history of the sport, that did what Prince Naseem did. And I ain't trying to brag, but I was bloody good at it. — Naseem Hamed

According to Callero, "Freedom of choice and self-determination are virtuous principles, but when selfish individual interests threaten to destroy the common good, the limits of individualism are exposed."4 Unfortunately but predictably, Callero is vague when it comes to defining "the common good" - a catchphrase with many variations that has been used by murderous dictators throughout history. May we therefore say that the "common good," when pushed to extremes, results in the likes of Stalin and Hitler? — George H. Smith

For any exam in history, here is the answer: all human history is the struggle between systems that attempt to shackle the human personality in the name of some intangible good on the one hand and systems that enable and expand the scope of human personality in the pursuit of extremely tangible aims. The American system is the most successful in the world because it harmonizes best with the aims and longings of human personality while allowing the best protection to other personalities. — Ben Stein

Jesus of Nazareth was a real man, living and dying at a turbulent moment in real space-time history. His message, and the message about him that the early Christians called good news, was not about how to escape that world. It was about how the one true God was changing it, radically and forever. — N. T. Wright

People who mock incidents in history such as 9/11 or the Holocaust, referring to it all as a hoax or stirring up crazy conspiracy theories about it, should really stop and think about their words first, both because it shows flaws in logic and rationality to deny the obvious, and because to play pretend with incidents which killed innocent people, well, that's just like laughing in the face of tragedy. It's as if to say, "no, it's not horrible enough that these people were killed, oh no, we have to drag on these incidents by indulging in melodramatic fantasies!" In essence this means that those who lost loved ones not only have to live with these losses forever, they also have to live with the people who deny that any of it ever happened. It does no good to forget history or to deny it. All it does is desensitize people; it tells them that it's all just a game, which then risks the possibility of nobody taking it seriously enough to prevent something similar from happening again. — Rebecca McNutt

As one reads history ... one is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed, but by the punishments that the good have inflicted. — Oscar Wilde

The whole course of human history may depend on a change of heart in a single, solitary, even humble individual. For it is within the soul of the individual that the battle between good and evil is waged and ultimately won or lost. — Henry David Thoreau

History will tell if we were really a good band or just a one day fly. — Billie Joe Armstrong

The idea of decimation as a lottery converts the new iconography of the Burgess Shale into a radical view about the pathways of life and the nature of history ... May our poor and improbable species find joy in its new-found fragility and good fortune! Wouldn't anyone with the slightest sense of adventure, or the most weakly flickering respect for intellect, gladly exchange the old cosmic comfort for a look at something so weird and wonderful - yet so real - as *Opabinia*? — Stephen Jay Gould

Most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally evil, but by people being fundamentally people. — Terry Pratchett

Theories about world literature, of which fairy tale is a fundamental part, emphasize the porousness of borders, geographical and inguistic: no frontiercan keep a good story from roaming. It will travel, and travel far, and travel back again in a different guise, a changed mood, and, above all, a new meaning. — Marina Warner

Did you know that for pretty much the entire history of the human species, the average life span was less than thirty years? You could count on ten years or so of real adulthood, right? There was no planning for retirement, There was no planning for a career. There was no planning. No time for plannning. No time for a future. But then the life spans started getting longer, and people started having more and more future. And now life has become the future. Every moment of your life is lived for the future
you go to high school so you can go to college so you can get a good job so you can get a nice house so you can afford to send your kids to college so they can get a good job so they can get a nice house so they can afford to send their kids to college. — John Green

A good part of 'The Information' is about the transition from an oral to a literary culture. Books effected such a great transformation in the way we think about the world, our history, our logic, mathematics, you name it. I think we would be greatly diminished as a people and as a culture if the book became obsolete. — James Gleick

History will see this as the residential commodification era, in which housing provision seemed to lose all contact between supply and demand of housing as a utility and simply focused on supply and demand of investment - and that is worrying.
Investment is good for the economy, but the investment you want is investment that goes into creating homes, workplaces and infrastructure, not investing in owning them and inflating asset prices. — Peter Rees

After a lifetime of hounding authors for advice, I've heard three truths from every mouth: (1) Writing is painful
it's 'fun' only for novices, the very young, and hacks; (2) other than a few instances of luck, good work only comes through revision; (3) the best revisers often have reading habits that stretch back before the current age, which lends them a sense of history and raises their standards for quality. — Mary Karr

Social scientific research is and always will be tentative and imperfect. It does not claim to transform economics, sociology, and history into exact sciences. But by patiently searching for facts and patterns and calmly analyzing the economic, social, and political mechanisms that might explain them, it can inform democratic debate and focus attention on the right questions. It can help to redefine the terms of debate, unmask certain preconceived or fraudulent notions, and subject all positions to constant critical scrutiny. In my view, this is the role that intellectuals, including social scientists, should play, as citizens like any other but with the good fortune to have more time than others to devote themselves to study (and even to be paid for it - a signal privilege). — Thomas Piketty

My early education was in the public school system of Omaha, where, retrospectively, I realize that my high school training served me in good stead for the basic subjects of mathematics, English, foreign languages and history. — Lawrence R. Klein

The happiness of the South was very formidable. It was an almost invincible happiness. It defied you to call it anything else. Everyone was in fact happy. The women were beautiful and charming. The men were healthy and successful and funny; they knew how to tell stories. They had everything the North had and more. They had a history, they had a place redolent with memories, they had good conversation, they believed in God and defended the Constitution, and they were getting rich in the bargain. They had the best of victory and defeat. Their happiness was aggressive and irresistible. — Walker Percy

The good news is, being a digital citizen comes naturally to many of us once we get the opportunity - human beings have been taking things apart and putting them back together throughout history. — Mitchell Baker

I'd love to do another 'Indiana Jones.' A character that has a history and a potential, kind of a rollicking good movie ride for the audience, Steven Spielberg as a director - what's not to like? — Harrison Ford

Great and good men and women stirred sugar into their coffee knowing that it had been picked by slaves. Kind, good ancestors of all of us never questioned hangings, burnings, tortures, inequality, suffering and injustice that today revolt us. If we dare to presume to damn them with our fleeting ideas of morality, then we risk damnation from our descendants for whatever it is that we are doing that future history will judge as intolerable and wicked: eating meat, driving cars, appearing on TV, visiting zoos, who knows? — Stephen Fry

There was no control except the mood of his power ... and it is for this reason it is good you never heard him play someplace where the weather for instance could change the next series of notes
then you should never have heard him at all. He was never recorded. He stayed away while others moved into wax history, electronic history, those who said later that Boldon broke the path. It was just as important to watch him stretch and wheel around the last notes or to watch nerves jumping under the sweat of his head. — Michael Ondaatje

Read good writing, and don't live in the present. Live in the deep past, with the language of the Koran or the Mabinogion or Mother Goose or Dickens or Dickinson or Baldwin or whatever speaks to you deeply. Literature is not high school and it's not actually necessary to know what everyone around you is wearing, in terms of style, and being influenced by people who are being published in this very moment is going to make you look just like them, which is probably not a good long-term goal for being yourself or making a meaningful contribution. At any point in history there is a great tide of writers of similar tone, they wash in, they wash out, the strange starfish stay behind, and the conches. — Rebecca Solnit

It's my belief that history is a wheel. 'Inconstancy is my very essence,' says the wheel. Rise up on my spokes if you like but don't complain when you're cast back down into the depths. Good time pass away, but then so do the bad. Mutability is our tragedy, but it's also our hope. The worst of time, like the best, are always passing away. — Tony Wilson

We have a history," I say, "that no one can take from us. No matter what happened in the past, no matter what happens from here, it can't take away from the good thing we had. You were my first love, Demi. You only get one. — Winter Renshaw

No matter how good a public school teacher, he or she will always be required to teach the state's values and the state's perspective on subjects from sex to history and biology. — Cal Thomas

I don't care so much anymore about 'good photography'; I am gathering evidence for history. — Gilles Peress

Bigotry is the disease of ignorance, of morbid minds; enthusiasm of the free and buoyant. Education and free discussion are the antidotes of both. We are destined to be a barrier against the returns of ignorance and barbarism. Old Europe will have to lean on our shoulders, and to hobble along by our side, under the monkish trammels of priests and kings, as she can. What a Colossus shall we be when the Southern continent comes up to our mark! What a stand will it secure as a ralliance for the reason & freedom of the globe! I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. So good night. I will dream on, always fancying that Mrs Adams and yourself are by my side marking the progress and the obliquities of ages and countries. — Thomas Jefferson

In the history of the world many souls have been, are, and will be, and with a little reflection this is marvelous and not depressing. Many jerks are made gloomy about it, for they think quantity buries them alive. That's just crazy. Numbers are very dangerous, but the main thing about them is that they humble your pride. And that's good. — Saul Bellow

And when you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don't just set out to do a good job. — Martin Luther King Jr.

A great step toward independence is a good-humoured stomach. — Seneca The Younger

Paternalistic is a very good word. They think they have to look out for these guys? Don't worry about it. Why? Because of history. Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant. They did okay. — Sonny Vaccaro

For almost half a century, Fermilab has occupied center stage as physicists have sought to understand the fundamental structure of the universe. The lab deserves a good history, and I'm happy to say that in this book it has one. The authors present a compelling, nuanced, and richly detailed account of the place from its beginnings to the present. — James Trefil

The first lesson of history is that evil is good. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

The strictly theoretical and so attractive dream of possible equality had been traded for the worst authoritarian nightmare in history when it was applied to reality, understood, with good reason (more, in this case), as the only criterion of truth. — Leonardo Padura

The only good histories are those that have been written by the persons themselves who commanded in the affairs whereof they write. — Michel De Montaigne

Gunn would be an important figure-rewarding, delightful, accomplished, enduring-in the history of English-language poetry even were his life not as fascinating as it now seems; he would be an important figure in the history of gay writing and in the history of transatlantic literary relations even were his poetry not so good as it is. With his life as it was and his works as they are, he's an obvious candidate for a volume of retrospective and critical essays, and this one is first-rate. — Stephen Burt

Why do I need TV when I have forty-eight apartment windows to watch across the vacant lot, and a sliver of Lake Erie? I've seen history out this window. So much. I was four when we moved here in 1919. The fruit-sellers' carts and coal wagons were pulled down the street by horses back then. I used to stand just here and watch the coal brought up by the handsome lad from Groza, the village my parents were born in. Gibb Street was mainly Rumanians back then. It was "Adio" - "Good-bye"- in all the shops when you left. Then the Rumanians started leaving. They weren't the first, or the last. This has always been a working-class neighborhood. It's like a cheap hotel - you stay until you've got enough money to leave. — Paul Fleischman

You remember your history?" He had finished five years of high school with respectable marks and a very good showing in trigonometry and geography but did not remember much history. In his final year, anyway, all you could think about was that you were going to the war. He said, "Not altogether. — Alice Munro

Good things don't come to those who wait. They come to those who agitate! — Julian Bond

Life's more important than a living. So many people who make a living are making death, not life. Don't ever join them. They're the gravediggers of our civilization - The safe men. The compromisers. The moneymakers. The muddlers-through.
Politics is full of them ... so is businesses ... so is the church. They're popular. Successful. Some of them work hard, other are slack, but all of them could tell a good story.
Never where there such charming gravediggers in the world's history. — James Hilton

Truly a good horse, good ground to gallop on, and sunshine, make up the sum of enjoyable travelling. — Isabella L. Bird

As the pretensions of modernity are unmasked today, it is a good time for us to recover our nerve, "always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks [us] for a reason for the hope that is in [us]" (1Pe 3:15). By breaking into our history, sharing our history, and transforming that history from the inside out, God has indeed made himself the object of our knowledge. — Michael S. Horton

Gods, he felt so good.
My hands splayed along his now clean torso and I leaned over and bit his bottom lip. No other man in the history of the universe was as hot as he was. I would dare anyone to say otherwise. My wolf barked her agreement. — Amanda Carlson

Deep Purple is a damn good band and we've made a niche in rock 'n' roll history. Maybe not a huge one but enough to be very proud of. — Jon Lord

I mean, when you think about it, jet travel is pretty freaking remarkable. You get in a plane, it defies the gravity of an entire planet by exploiting a loophole with air pressure, and it flies across distances that would take months or years to cross by any means of travel that has been significant for more than a century or three. You hurtle above the earth at enough speed to kill you instantly should you bump into something, and you can only breathe because someone built you a really good tin can that has seams tight enough to hold in a decent amount of air. Hundreds of millions of man-hours of work and struggle and research, blood, sweat, tears, and lives have gone into the history of air travel, and it has totally revolutionized the face of our planet and societies. But get on any flight in the country, and I absolutely promise you that you will find someone who, in the face of all that incredible achievement, will be willing to complain about the drinks. The drinks, people. — Jim Butcher

It might be a good idea if the various countries of the world would occasionally swap history books, just to see what other people are doing with the same set of facts. — Bill Vaughan

They don't go into what is the cause of goodness, so why of the other shop? If lewdies are good that's because they like it, and I wouldn't ever interfere with their pleasures, and so of the other shop. And I was patronizing the other shop. More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me on our oddy knockies, and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning they of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. And is not our modern history, my brothers, the story of the brave malenky selves fighting these big machines? — Anthony Burgess

Photography as a subject is a good one. Its history is only about 150 years ... You only have to know about twenty-five or thirty names and that's it. All you need. In painting there are more than 1,000. — William Wegman

Now, a good education is about so much more than just learning geometry or memorizing dates in history. All of that is important, but an education is also about exploring new things
discovering what makes you come alive, and then being your best at whatever you choose — Michelle Obama

Percy stared at his jelly donut. He had a rocky history with Nico di Angelo. The guy had once tricked him into visiting Hades's palace, and Percy had ended up in a cell. But most of the time, Nico sided with the good guys. He certainly didn't deserve slow suffocation in a bronze jar, and Percy couldn't stand seeing Hazel in pain.
"We'll rescue him," he promised her. "We have to. The prophecy says he holds the key to endless death. — Rick Riordan

The great danger in the South comes precisely from the fact that the public is not informed. Newspapers shirk notoriously their editorial responsibilities and print what they think their readers want. They lean with the prevailing winds and employ every fallacy of logic in order to editorialize harmoniously with popular prejudices. They also keep a close eye on possible economic reprisals from the Councils and the Klans, plus other superpatriotic groups who bring pressure to bear on the newspapers' advertisers. In addition, most adhere to the long-standing conspiracy of silence about anything remotely favorable to the Negro. His achievements are carefully excluded or, when they demand attention, are handled with the greatest care to avoid the impression that anything good the individual Negro does is typical of his race. — John Howard Griffin

Why the delay? Why does God let evil and pain so flagrantly exist, even thrive, on this planet? ... He holds back for our sakes. Re-creation involves us; we are, in fact, at the center of his plan ... the motive behind all human history, is to develop us, not God. Our very existence announces to the powers in the universe that restoration is under way. Every act of faith by every one of the people of God is like the tolling of a bell, and a faith like Job's reverberates throughout the universe. — Philip Yancey

Since Caesar, we know his historians are liars. The good writers get read. Bad history doesn't get read. — Peter Greenaway

And what we students of history always learn is that the human being is a very complicated contraption and that they are not good or bad but are good and bad and the good comes out of the bad and the bad out of the good, and the devil take the hindmost. — Robert Penn Warren

I took on a year of reading books for a reason. Because words are witness to life: they record what has happened, and they make it all real. Words create the stories that become history and become unforgettable. Even fiction portrays truth: good fiction is truth. — Nina Sankovitch

The secret to the movie business, or any business, is to get a good education in a subject besides film - whether it's history, psychology, economics, or architecture - so you have something to make a movie about. All the skill in the world isn't going to help you unless you have something to say. — George Lucas

History shows that anything conducive to our national stability is good. — Jiang Zemin

Among all the many great transitions that have marked the evolution of Western civilisation ... there has been only one - the triumph of Christianity - that can be called in the fullest sense a "revolution": a truly massive and epochal revision of humanity's prevailing vision of reality, so pervasive in its influence and so vast in its consequences as to actually have created a new conception of the world, of history, of human nature, of time, and of the moral good. — David Bentley Hart

Through the history of the world there have always been exploiters and exploited. There always will be ... because the great mass of men are made by nature to be slaves, they are unfit to control themselves, and for their own good need masters. — W. Somerset Maugham

There are illusions of popular history which a successful religion must promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumphs; a good deed is its own reward; any bad human can be reformed; religious talismans protect one from demon possession; only females understand the ancient mysteries; the rich are doomed to unhappiness. — Frank Herbert

There are no heroes and there are no villains. There are just opposing points of view. That's all history is...the viciously long battle between world views. — Peter J. Tomasi

If the only one who can kill an angel can't do it, then who can?'
It's a good question, one that takes me a minute to come up with an answer. 'Obadiah West can. Him and his freedom fighters. I'm just a teenager.'
'History is filled with teenagers who lead the fight. Joan of Arc. Okita Soji, the samurai. Alexander the Great. They were all teenagers when they began leading their armies. I think we're back to those times again, kid. — Susan Ee

Life is like a hurricane here in Duckburg
Race cars, lasers, aeroplanes, it's a duck-blur!
Might solve a mystery
Or rewrite history!

DuckTales! Woo-oo!
Everyday they're out there making
DuckTales! Woo-oo!
Tales of derring do-bad and good
Luck Tales! Woo-oo!

When it seems they're heading for final curtain,
Good deduction never fails, that's for certain!
The worst of messes
Become successes!

D-d-d-danger! Watch behind you!
There's a stranger out to find you
What to do, just grab on to some
DuckTales!

DuckTales! Woo-oo!

D-d-d-danger! Watch behind you!
There's a stranger out to find
What to do, just grab on to some
DuckTales! Woo-oo! — Walt Disney Company

We are so dull that we rarely realize how much history lies hidden in marriage, and how the one word spoken by the bride makes all the difference between cattle-raising and a nation's good breeding. — Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy

Everyone has got their own ideas and they push them and say to hell with everyone else. That's the history of the human race. It got us on top, only now it is pushing us off. The thing is that people will put up with any kind of discomfort, and dying babies, and old age at thirty as long as it has always been that way. Try to get them to change and they fight you, even while they're dying, saying it was good enough for grandpa so it's good enough for me. Bango, dead. — Harry Harrison

If anyone thinks they'd rather be in a different part of history, they're probably not a very good student of history. Life sucked in the old days. People knew very little, and you were likely to die at a young age of some horrible disease. You'd probably have no teeth by now. It would be particularly awful if you were a woman. — Elon Musk

Most of the mess that is called history comes about because kings and presidents cannot be satisfied with a nice chicken and a good loaf of bread. — Jennifer Donnelly