Historic Quotes & Sayings

The theory of the transference of the collective will of the people to historic persons may perhaps explain much in the domain of jurisprudence and be essential for its purposes, but in its application to history, as soon as revolutions, conquests, or civil wars occur - that is, as soon as history begins - that theory explains nothing. — Leo Tolstoy

As we celebrate President Reagan's remarkable career and historic legacy, we also celebrate a man of strong character, deep conviction, unforgettable charm, and wonderful wit. — Jim Ramstad

Challenges of historic import threaten America's future. Action on the deficit, economy, energy, health care and much more is imperative, yet our legislative institutions fail to act. Congress must be reformed. — Evan Bayh

This historic Christian doctrine of the divinity of Christ does not simply mean that Jesus is like God.
It is far more radical than that. It means that God is like Jesus. — D. Elton Trueblood

A Catholic understanding of priesthood is so strongly rooted in the historic actions of Jesus and in all their antecedents in the place of sacrifice in life. And those things ... they are rooted to the role of the man. — Vincent Nichols

Our view of history diminishes the reality of the past. We concentrate on the historic event as something that has happened, and in so doing we ignore it as a moment which, at the time, is happening. — Ian Mortimer

To those who are incapable of presenting the historic truth in an honest way, I want to say that Poland was not a perpetrator but a victim of World War Two. — Ewa Kopacz

When God saw that Abraham had not withheld his only son, he swore to bless all nations through Abraham's seed (see Gn 22:15-22). Since the blessing of a father is reserved for his family, this oath is nothing less than God's pledge to restore the human race as his own worldwide family. That is why the establishment of the Catholic Church must be attributed to God's faithfulness and power. It represents nothing less than the historic fulfillment of God's sworn covenant to Abraham. — Scott Hahn

I'm too old to be ignorant as I am."
--Twelve-year-old Gabriella to the general, who does not want her to know about Emmett Till and the world's brutality. — Elle Thornton

Although Israel was founded based on the historic Jewish homeland and the need to have a Jewish homeland, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly. And I think that that is what's best about Israeli democracy. — Barack Obama

Past the sloping green lawn of the park, I entered a new world, regal and historic. Here I walked on swept sidewalks, past pristine buildings and small shops and young mothers or West Indian nannies with children in tow on their way to the playground. Stylish women carried twine-handled shopping bags. The cafes were busy and a church bell praised noon as I ducked underground. — Andrew Cotto

I've never been very attached to genre labels and never set out intentionally to write historic fiction. Besides, what you consider historic depends on how far back your memory extends. — Charles Frazier

I had begun to grasp, in the past few weeks, one of the great and uncovenanted delights of Greece; a pre-coming of age present in my case: a direct and immediate link, friendly and equal on either side, between human beings, something which melts barriers of hierarchy and background and money and, except for a few tribal and historic feuds, politics and nationality as well... Existence, these glances say, is a torment, an enemy, an adventure and a joke which we are in league to undergo, outwit, exploit and enjoy on equal terms as accomplices, fellow-hedonists and fellow-victims. — Patrick Leigh Fermor

My agent is based in New York. And due to a historic accident, my publishing track is primarily American - I'm sold into the UK almost as a foreign import! So I'm quite out of touch with what's going on in UK publishing. — Charles Stross

The anger washed away in the knowledge that I was a hypocrite. I don't know how much of it showed on my face, but Jean-Claude cocked his head to one side. "Thoughts are flying across your face, ma petite, but what thoughts?" I stared up at him. "I think I owe you an apology." His eyes widened. "Then this is a truly historic occasion. What are you apologizing for?" I — Laurell K. Hamilton

No comets crashing, nothing you could really call a nuclear war. Just everything else, tangled in the changing climate: droughts, water shortages, crop failures, honeybees gone like they almost were now, collapse of other keystone species, every last alpha predator gone, antibiotics doing even less than they already did, diseases that were never quite the one big pandemic but big enough to be historic events in themselves. And all of it around people: how people were, how many of them there were, how they'd changed things just by being there. — William Gibson

We owe an historic debt to American Indians. They have a unique set of concerns that haven't been addressed, and I'd like to stand with them. Also, I'd like to get their views on immigration. — Al Franken

Ending mass surveillance of private phone calls under the Patriot Act is a historic victory for the rights of every citizen. Yet while we have reformed this one program, many others remain. — Edward Snowden

By focusing once and for all on helping the Palestinians build a free society, I have no doubt that an historic compromise between Israelis and Palestinians can be reached and that peace can prevail. — Natan Sharansky

My ambition for station was always easily controlled. If the place came to me it was welcome. But it never seemed to me worth seeking at the cost of self-respect, or independence. My family were not historic; they were well-to-do, did not hold or seek office. It was easy for me to be contented in private life. An honor was no honor to me, if obtained by my own seeking. — Rutherford B. Hayes

I don't have a big thing about leaving my mark or being historic. — Fiona Apple

The issue of homosexuality in the church is complex, highly charged, and defined by misrecognized fears related to rapid social change and the perceived threat to familiar social institutions and the sense of security they represent. Underlying this conflict are the church's historic discomfort with issues of sexuality, and dualistic constructions that codify that unease into categories of sexual insiders (monogamous heterosexuals and celibates) and outsiders (everybody else). These have been magnified in recent years by cultural differences between different generations and African countries where the church has grown. — Jane Ellen Nickell

No government has the right to decide on the truth of scientific principles, nor to prescribe in any way the character of the questions investigated. Neither may a government determine the aesthetic value of artistic creations, nor limit the forms of literacy or artistic expression. Nor should it pronounce on the validity of economic, historic, religious, or philosophical doctrines. Instead it has a duty to its citizens to maintain the freedom, to let those citizens contribute to the further adventure and the development of the human race. — Richard Feynman

St. Augustine is not only the oldest continuously-occupied European settlement on the American continent, it is also perhaps the most haunted city in the United States. Seemingly every spot in this city has some ghostly hidden history, right below the surface. Just by strolling through the historic streets you can hear the whispers of the long-dead. — James Caskey

They must attack us in order to survive, just as we must destroy them to advance our historic mission. — Michael A. Ledeen

We must now view our problems as opportunities - historic opportunities to change the failed systems of the past and do what's right for our future. — Bob Riley

But the good deed, through the ages Living in historic pages, Brighter grows and gleams immortal, Unconsumed by moth or rust. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Fortunately, historians are now beginning to recognise the historic role of Islam as a liberating force for peoples oppressed by the burdens of unjust social systems. — Aly Khan

In the end, the Labour party could cease to represent labour. Stranger historic ironies have happened than that. — Enoch Powell

I'm living out a childhood fantasy. Our house is in a historic district of a small town that I used to read about in storybooks. — Patty Duke

The custom to put others in the line of fire is a recurring theme in Judaism. It boils down to the Levite Korahites' willingness to sacrifice their ordinary Jewish subjects in order to ensure their own survival. This should be a historic warning to modern-day Israelites: their orthodox government would not hesitate to risk the lives of the many for the sake of the survival of the few in the orthodox elite. The citizens of Israel will have to think about how to remove the systemic threat that comes from within their own ranks. — A.J. Deus

People in millenniums ahead will know what we were like in the 1930's and the thing that, the important major things that shaped our history at that time. This is as important for historic reasons as any other. — Gordon Parks

There's the landmark Columbia Restaurant. Try the paella, or the 1905 salad. That virgin olive oil they use!" Serge kissed his fingertips. "Know why it's called the 1905 salad? That's the year they first opened. Very historic. Over a hundred years in the same spot. And you know what that means? Everyone who ate those first salads: all dead. — Tim Dorsey

The erosion of equal opportunity is among the greatest threats to our exceptionalism as a nation. But it also provides us with an exciting and historic opportunity: to help more people than ever achieve the American Dream. — Marco Rubio

I incline to an aristocratic republic. This would satisfy the ambitious spirit among our people. We shall learn from the historic mistakes of others in the same way as we learn from our own; for we are a modern nation and wish to be the most modern in the world. — Theodor Herzl

If you want to make history, you have to do historic things — Kobe Bryant

I read that they have buried his body like a dog's - without funeral rites, without tribal wail, with no solemn song or act. That is the deed of to-day. That is the best that this generation has to give to this noble historic character, this man who in his person ends the line of aboriginal sanctities older that the religion of Christian or Jew. Very well. So let it stand for the present. But there is a generation coming that shall reverse this judgement of ours. Our children shall build monuments to those whom we stoned, and the great aboriginals whom we killed will be counted by the future American as among the historic characters of the continent. — Bill Yenne

Is it better to have bronze than copper and tin separately? Is this the marker of some historic advance? — Claudia Pineiro

That's a good thing for me. I own everything, I have 100% creative control, I own all my masters, everything. I'm blessed to be in that situation. If we sell some records, I think we'll just add to the historic pace that this has been going at. — Drake

The problem with the word "vagina" is that vaginas seem to be just straight-out bad luck. Only a masochist would want one, because only awful things happen to them. Vaginas get torn. Vaginas get "examined.".. No. Let's clear this up right now - I don't actually have a vagina. I never have. I, personally, have a cunt. Cunt is a proper, old, historic, strong word, and it doubles up as the most potent swear word in the English language. Yeah. That's how powerful it is, guys. If I tell you what I've got down there, old ladies and clerics might faint. I like how shocked people are when you say "cunt." Compared to this, the most powerful swear word men have got out of their privates is "dick," which is frankly vanilla. In a culture where nearly everything female is still seen as squeam-inducing and/or weak - menstruation, menopause, just the sheer, simple act of calling someone "a girl" - I love that "cunt" stands on its own, as the supreme, unvanquishable word. — Caitlin Moran

The Rock'n'Blues Fest is my kind of festival series! It's always great playing shows with my brother and, add to that, all the other great artists and their bands and this should make for one historic round of concerts. — Johnny Winter

I race historic muscle cars back in Australia, and that's my hobby. And I try to race home as soon as I've finished a movie but don't tell anyone. — Eric Bana

I think that if I have a chance to go back, why not just go back all the way in history to the times of the pyramids or the Roman days? I think there are so many great historic times until now that I would like to get a little peek of those periods, rather than just 1984. Why limit yourself? — Arnold Schwarzenegger

As Patrick Harpur points out, we cannot 'explain' or 'decode' a myth. To look for the historic or scientific 'truth' of a myth is but to retell the myth, albeit in a less satisfying way. We render unto materialism the control of our most precious mythologies if we allow them to be 'scientifically explained' to us. A new language is required. New words. — Gordon White

the Clinton administration always had its banana republic side. For all the talk about historic presidential "philandering," it is hard to recall any other White House which has had to maintain a quasi-governmental or para-state division devoted exclusively to the bullying and defamation of women. Like — Christopher Hitchens

I feel like Jonah Hill would be a good selfie, or Jennifer Lawrence. They'd be really good ones ... Historic. — Sarah Hyland

In recent years, as personal memories have faded, another perspective is beginning to make a tentative appearance in China. This view acknowledges the colossal wrongs committed during the Cultural Revolution, but it begins to inquire whether perhaps Mao raised an important question, even if his answer to it proved disastrous. The problem Mao is said to have identified is the relationship of the modern state - especially the Communist state - to the people it governs. In largely agricultural - and even incipient industrial - societies, governance concerns issues within the capacity of the general public to understand. Of course, in aristocratic societies, the relevant public is limited. But whatever the formal legitimacy, some tacit consensus by those who are to carry out directives is needed - unless governance is to be entirely by imposition, which is usually unsustainable over a historic period. — Henry Kissinger

I want to be the first to bless you on what God has blessed you with - fighting in the heart of the Muslim world that was a battleground for large historic Islamic wars and what is now the place of Islam's greatest war in the present era. — Bill Vaughan

significance), 600,000 known archaeological sites (and more being found every day; more being lost, too), 3,500 historic cemeteries, 70,000 war memorials, 4,000 sites of special scientific interest, 18,500 medieval churches, and 2,500 museums containing 170 million objects. Having such a fund of richness means that it can sometimes be taken for granted to a shocking degree, but — Bill Bryson

I have had the rich satisfaction of knowing and working with many openly gay and lesbian Americans, and I have come to realize that "gay" is an artificial category when it comes to measuring a man or woman's on-the-job performance or commitment to shared goals. It says little about the person. Our differences and prejudices pale next to our historic challenge. — Alan K. Simpson

The sweet smell of the South, of Camellias and Azaleas, clings to Beaufort's ancient and historic buildings. — Walter Cronkite

Nowadays ... deals are transactional rather than personal. Instead of placing your faith in a person, you get lawyers to write safeguards into the contract. This is an historic shift from a trust economy to a risk economy. But trust is not a dispensable luxury. It is the very basis of our social life. Many scholars believe that capitalism had religious roots because people could trust other people who, feeling that they were answerable to God, could be relied on to be honest in business. A world without trust is a lonely and dangerous place. — Jonathan Sacks

Covering a historic event is perfectly legitimate. It's not sneaking into somebody's boudoir ... These people belong to history, and not to record that if you have the opportunity would be wrong. — Elliott Erwitt

This formidable officine dates from Peter the Great, who formed it in 1697...its historic origins must, however, be looked for much earlier; one finds them in the byzantine traditions and in the operations of the Tartar domination...espionage, delation, torture, and secret executions were the normal and regulating instruments of the |||||||| police. — Maurice Paleologue

I am constantly amazed by how little difference there is between religions.' Selene sighed. 'It seems the arguments are always over the details. Mary or Isis, Jesus or Horus. Maybe Hypatia is right and names don't matter, just the search for godliness in the life we live. — Faith L. Justice

The most beautiful landscapes in the world, if they evoke no memory, if they bear no trace of a remarkable event, are uninteresting compared to historic landscapes. — Madame De Stael

Les amis de l'abc... a group which barely missed becoming historic — Victor Hugo

This is the most historic moment in Supreme Court history in our lifetime, no question about it. These are justices who are going to serve for decades. — Jay Alan Sekulow

Historic in a good sense, not historic in a sense of 'so we dropped bombs on everyone. — Jon Stewart

I am convinced that climate change represents a historic opportunity on an even greater scale. — Naomi Klein

The historic beauty of BJJ rests not with its ability to allow a smaller man to maim a larger man, but with its ability to allow any man of any size to survive. — Cameron Conaway

Tom Walls and his cohort are wolves in sheep's clothing who will besmirch the memory of some genuine historic figures by the next full moon. — Dionne Warwick

Our freedoms were born in the ideals of the Enlightenment and the musket fires of an historic revolution. — John Boehner

There were protocols to meet for the historic occasion. On the lunar dust they placed mementoes for the five-deceased American and Soviet spacemen, Gus Grissom, Ed White, Roger Chaffee, Vladimir Komarov, and Yuri Gagarin (who died in a plane crash in 1968). They unsheathed a metal disc on the descent stage with engraved messages to future moon visitors. As Neil Armstrong read the plaque's words, his voice carried throughout the world. "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the moon, July 1969, AD. We came in peace for all mankind." There was yet another small cargo - private and precious - carried by Neil Armstrong to the moon. It was not divulged at the time, but he carried the diamond-studded astronaut pin made especially for Deke Slayton by the three Apollo 1 astronauts and presented to him by their widows after that dreadful fire. — Alan Shepard

At a time when history made its way slowly, the few events were easily remembered and woven into a backdrop, known to everyone, before which private life unfolded the gripping show of its adventures. Nowadays, time moves forward at a rapid pace. Forgotten overnight, a historic event glistens the next day like the morning dew and thus is no longer the backdrop to a narrator's tale but rather an amazing adventure enacted against the background of the over-familiar banality of private life. — Milan Kundera

The mountain is not something eternally sublime; it has a great historic and spiritual meaning to us. It stands for us as the ladder of life. Nay, more; it is the ladder of the soul and in a curious way the source of religion. From it came the Law, from it came the Gospel in the Sermon of the Mount. We may trul say that the highest religion is the Religion of the Mountain. — Jan Smuts

The Chinese Government and I myself have always attached great importance to China-U.S. relations. In the new historic era, I look forward to working together with you to continuously strengthen dialogue and exchanges between our two countries. — Hu Jintao

Sheikh Abdullah held an unrivaled place in the history of Kashmir and in the historic transition from tradition to modernity. He left an indelible impact on the political landscape of Kashmir. He was a Charismatic leader having a magnetic quality to change the mood of the public and drove them in the direction he desired. — Tarif Naaz

History is finite-there's only so much you can learn about a six square block historic district in New York City. (Dark City Lights) — Kat Georges

But despite historic levels of obstruction, President Obama was able to bring the economy back from the verge of a second Great Depression. — Steny Hoyer

Obama is hardly the first president to seek rapprochement with our adversaries and reconciliation with our enemies, of course. But his determination to make nice - even in the face of clear and repeated rejection from the other side - is unparalleled. For Obama and his team, diplomacy with rogue regimes is an end in itself, and any deal, however one-sided, is a win, especially one that the White House communications mavens think that friendly media will call a 'breakthrough' or 'historic.' — Stephen F. Hayes

It never occurred to me that I was hired because I was black. But it did occur to me that because I was black it would give a different historic element to the film. — Duane Jones

We have an historic opportunity for a great global healing and renewal. If we will accept the challenge of nonviolent activism with faith, courage, and determination, we can bring this great vision of a world united in peace and harmony from a distant ideal into glowing reality. — Coretta Scott King

Historic accounts of the lives of great masters have told of rainbows and other special signs, like the rain of flowers, and of special clouds that appeared, witnessed by people on very special occasions and at auspicious events. — Jamgon Kongtrul

Our Ancestors knew that healing comes in cycles and circles.

One generation carries the pain so that the next can live and heal.

One cannot live without the other, each is the other's hope, meaning & strength. — Gemma B. Benton

Despite the variety of my explorations, throughout it all it has been my contention that my responsibility as an artist is to work, to sing for my supper, to make art, beautiful and powerful, that adds and reveals; to beautify the mess of a messy world, to heal the sick and feed the helpless; to shout bravely from the roof-tops and storm barricaded doors and voice the specifics of our historic moment. — Carrie Mae Weems

If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of Revolution; when the old and the new stand side by side, and admit of being compared; when the energies of all men are searched by fear and by hope; when the historic glories of the old can be compensated by the rich possibilities of the new era? — Ralph Waldo Emerson

One of the questions I face when working on a book about a historical event is whether I should visit the actual place that I'm writing about. No matter how scrupulously maintained a historic house or battlefield may be, it is nothing like it was in the long-ago past. — Nathaniel Philbrick

The study of Nature brings into a harmonious whole the questions of the Infinite, the Historic, and the Microscopic as part of the Great Creator's work. — Robert Baden-Powell

The biggest accomplishment, in racial terms, for Barack Obama was being elected. He had to overcome his blackness to be elected. He climbed the Mt. Everest of American politics, becoming an historic first. — Randall Kennedy

We stand today at a unique and extraordinary moment. The crisis in the Persian Gulf , as grave as it is, also offers a rare opportunity to move toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective - a new world order - can emerge: a new era - freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace. An era in which the nations of the world, East and West, North and South, can prosper and live in harmony. — George H. W. Bush

At a time when our country is waging two wars, approval ratings for Congress are at historic lows, unemployment is at a 70-year high and financial institutions have collapsed around us, I can't imagine anyone seriously opposing a National Day of Prayer. — Franklin Graham

To believe in Jesus, is to believe that the historic person who lived on this earth more than 2000 years ago was the image of the invisible God. That's a huge leap of faith, but it is my leap of faith, it's the act of faith of the Christian community. — Richard Rohr

My father never put a book into my hands and never forbade a book. Instead, he let me roam and graze, making my own more or less appropriate selections. I read gory tales of historic heroism that nine-teenth century parents were suitable for children, and gothic ghost stories that were surely not; I read accounts of arduous travel through treacherous lands undertaken by spinsters in crinolines, and I read handbooks on decorum and etiquette intended for young ladies of good family; I read books with pictures and books without; books in English, books in French, books in languages I didn't understand where I could make up stories in my head on the basis of a handful of guessed-at words. Books. Books. And books. — Diane Setterfield

We've taken bold action at home by making historic investments in renewable energy, by putting our people to work increasing efficiency in our homes and buildings, and by pursuing comprehensive legislation to transform to a clean energy economy. — Barack Obama

The art of the great historic civilizations never impress us as much as an Eskimo harpoon or a mask from the South Pacific. The contact is physical, and the feeling we experience is very much like acute anxiety. Inner or outer space, the world below or beyond, becomes a great weight pressing down upon us. Each work is a solid block of time, time standing still, time more massive than a mountain, despite the fact that it is as intangible as air or thought. The handiwork of primitive peoples reveals the time before time. — Octavio Paz

We have a historic system in place since the early part of the last century and this is going to be one of the biggest battles in California if we decide to take it on. — Marc Levine

The catch is that for most people the New Testament is taken as proof for the conventional picture of Christian origins, and the conventional picture is taken as proof for the way in which the New Testament was written. . . . For this reason the New Testament is commonly viewed and treated as a charter document that came into being much like the Constitution of the United States. According to this view, the authors of the New Testament were all present at the historic beginnings of the new religion and collectively wrote their gospels and letters for the purpose of founding the Christian church that Jesus came to inaugurate. Unfortunately for this view, that is not the way it happened. — Burton L. Mack

The true makes of history are the spiritual men whom the world knew not, the unregarded agents of the creative action of the Spirit. The supreme instance of this-the key to the Christian understanding of history-is to be found in the Incarnation- the presence of the maker of the world in the world unknown to the world ... The Incarnation is itself in a sense the divine fruit of history-of the fullness of time-and it finds its extension and completion in the historic life of the Church. — Christopher Dawson

This Constitutional Republic called America is an historic aberration. Any honest student of history will note that the prevailing socio-economic system is feudalism, where a tiny minority control the vast majority of wealth, power, and resources. In doing so, they have absolute control over the 99% of the population. Power equals control. — Howard Nemerov

Apostasy occurs when a church leaves its historic moorings, abandons its historic confessional position, and degenerates into a state where either essential Christian truths are blatantly denied or the denial of such truths is widely tolerated. — R.C. Sproul

Historic figures have homes to visit for posterity; the Lord of history left no home. Luminaries leave libraries and write their memoirs; He left one book, penned by ordinary people. Deliverers speak of winning through might and conquest; He spoke of a place in the heart. — Ravi Zacharias

Get it out of your historic head. — Imogen Cunningham

Nearly every historic fruit and vegetable variety once found in the United States has disappeared. — Preeti Simran Sethi

It is no mere coincidence that there is both an historic and a present relationship between community (people assisting each other) and a poverty of power due to financial recession. — Bill Mollison

Back in the car, we pass turnoffs for the Lakotas Buffalo Reservation and several pioneer homesteads turned into state monuments. There are bronze National Historic Site markers every five miles or so along the road. The quiet, the utter lack of people makes me feel watched. I continue glancing in the rearview as I drive, searching for pursuit. — Tessa Gratton

Since the soon-to-be outnumber the living; since the living have greater impact on the unborn than ever before thanks to depletion of natural systems, atmospheric disruption, toxic residue, burgeoning technology, global markets, genetic engineering, and sheer population numbers; since our scientific and historic understandings now comfortably examine processes embracing eons; and now that our plan-ahead horizon has shrunk to five years or less - it would seem that a grave disconnect is in progress. Our everhastier decisions and actions do not respond to our long-term understanding, or to the gravity of responsibility we bear. "The — Stewart Brand

The historic glory of America lies in the fact that it is the one nation that was founded like a church. That is, it was founded on a faith that was not merely summed up after it had exited, but was defined before it existed. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

All the Cosmic Drama, as it is written in the four Gospels, should be lived inside ourselves, here and now. The isn't something merely historic, it's something to live, here and now! — Samael Aun Weor

We were trying, as I irrelevantly analyzed it, to avoid what might be termed a historic mistake. We were trying to understand, that is, whether we were in a preapocalyptic situation, like the European Jews in the thirties or the last citizens of Pompeii, or whether our situation was merely near-apocalyptic, like that of the Cold War inhabitants of New York, London, Washington — Joseph O'Neill