Lesson From The Past Quotes & Sayings

...one may easily define two diametrically opposed lessons to be drawn from Jewish history: one holds that the memory of Jewish suffering should lead to a humanistic, universalist approach emphasizing the dangers of intolerance and racism; this is the lesson embodied in the repeated historical reminders that the Jews were brought 'out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage,' and that consequently, they were enjoined, 'love ye therefore the stranger, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.'"

"The other lesson seeks revenge for past sufferings, and beckons the Jews, now that they have their state, to hunt with the wolves and - invoking the injunction to remember the Amalekites - seeks to apply rules of exclusiveness laid down in totally different circumstances. — Amnon Rubinstein

Prince, cast aside these Foreign Airs, which don't speak, 'cept to the Head," said I (without Thought, but only Combustion of the Tongue), crying, "Poor timid Creature, cast them aside, and instead play the Simple Things in your HEART!"
He replied, "What is in my Heart is not simple."
& I says, "Then you han't listened."
& He says, "I listen, & cannot understand its Speech."
& I says, "Then it ain't your Heart you hear."
"The Human Heart," recited he bitterly as if from some damp Lesson, "is a Muscle that operates through Constriction." His Work on the Oysters grew defiant. "I have seen a Heart lying on a Plate, jolted with Electricity. It had as much to say dead as alive."
Now I was terrified at his Past & his Secrets & I asked for no more Music. — M T Anderson

Life Lesson 8: Change is always hard, but time softens the rough edges and eases the pull of the past. Eventually, we all climb out from under the bed, and even the most unfamiliar places begin to feel like home. — Patti Davis

We should not forget, no matter how we quantify it: 'Freedom is not free.' It is a painful lesson, but one from which we have learned in the past and one we should never forget. — Paul Gillmor

I looked at my son and put my hand on his arm. 'I'd really like to know....What could I have done in the past that would have helped when you were growing up? How could I have been a better mother?'
He thought about it for a few moments and then answered, 'When I was growing up--and even during my difficult years--I would have liked it if you had listened more to my heart than to my words.' ...
Sometimes our children use words or a tone that communicates something completely different from what they are struggling with inside--whether it's fear or insecurity or pain. I realized that this is a great lesson for me to learn and something that could be applied to all my relationships. — Christopher Yuan

There is one lesson from the past, in particular, that we cannot afford to ignore: You cannot make progress on gender equality or broader human development without safeguarding women's reproductive health and rights. — Hillary Clinton

To the left, civil rights are like a subway: When you reach your stop, you get off. Meanwhile, I'll just repeat what I said yesterday: For the New Yorker's target audience, the equivalence of free speech advocates to "gun nuts" is a clear signal of where they're supposed to fall on the argument. But all I can say is that if the "speech nuts" do as well as the "gun nuts" have done over the past couple of decades, we'll be in pretty good shape. And the lesson from the "gun nuts" is: Don't compromise, don't admit that there's such a thing as a "reasonable restriction," don't back down, and keep pointing out that your opponents are liars and hypocrites. And punish the hell out of politicians who vote with the other side. - Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit, 11 August 2015 — Vox Day

I had a massive heart attack, and in my belief that I was close to dying, I took the opportunity to teach my son about death. That lesson increased his faith in such a way that he completely accepted all the changes that life brings us. He learned that only the present exists. From that moment on, he began living in the present time, knowing that the future is just a possibility, and without believing all the opinions from the past. He understood that there are no guides, or masters. Each one of us is our own guru, and we can only save ourselves. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

I couldn't stop it from happening," I told her. "I've been able to stop it before, but this time I just couldn't stop it from happening." "Well, now." Her blue eyes were very wise. "You've learned a valuable lesson from this, then, haven't you? You can't cheat fate, Julia. If you don't go looking for the lessons of the past, then the past will come looking for you. — Susanna Kearsley

My past made me who I am today. I can't just pretend it never happened. But the biggest lesson I learnt from that, is that I can be an example for others who are still struggling! There's always hope and help for everyone. I think it's my responsibility to do that, to help. I always refer to this as the "moment of clarity". It's hard to explain what really happened, but it was a once in a lifetime kind of moment. I had reached my lowest point and I just knew things had to change quickly because there was just no other way, you know. — Cory Monteith

I point out to you, Marcus Claire Luyseyal, a lesson from past over-machined societies which you appear not to have learned. The devices themselves condition the
users to employ each other the way they employ machines. — Frank Herbert

Learning your lesson from a mistake is healthy, but living forever in the emotions of your past mistakes is toxic and debilitating. — Bryant McGill

As I've always said to Talyn, tough times never last. But tough Andarions. I learned that from watching you as a boy. Your parents, grandparents, and Keris treated you like shit and yet you never once spoke against them. You'd just lift your chin and carry on. 'Barking dogs don't bother me,' you used to say. 'Sooner or later, they reach the end of their yard and hit a fence. I'll keep going past it, and won't hear them anymore. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Turning back to embrace the past has been a long, slow lesson not only in self-esteem, but in patriotism - pride in homeland, heritage. It has taken a decade to whip the shame, to mispronounce words and shun grammar when mispronunciation and misspeaking are part of my dialect, to own the bad blood. What I come from has made me who I am. — Janisse Ray

This is another lesson from the transformative movements of the past: all of them understood that the process of shifting cultural values - though somewhat ephemeral and difficult to quantify - was central to their work. And so they dreamed in public, showed humanity a better version of itself, modeled different values in their own behavior, and in the process liberated the political imagination and rapidly altered the sense of what was possible. — Naomi Klein

The fact that Newton and Michael Faraday and other scientists of the past were deeply religious shows that religious skepticism is not a prejudice that governed science from the beginning, but a lesson that has been learned through centuries of experience in the study of nature. — Steven Weinberg

Silver sparkles from inside caught in the air and rolled in the wind past her. She took a deep breath, and it made her stand up straighter. Sugar and vanilla and butter.
That relentless scent had been following her around all her life. Sometimes she could see it, like this, but most of the time she felt it. When she was a kid, she could be sitting in class at school, or walking her dog Chester, or in the middle of a dreary violin lesson with her older brother, and the smell would suddenly appear out of nowhere and make her inexplicably restless. Even now, sometimes she would wake up at night and swear someone was baking a cake in the house. — Sarah Addison Allen

If there is one lesson for U.S. foreign policy from the past 10 years, it is surely that military intervention can seem simple but is in fact a complex affair with the potential for unintended consequences. — Fareed Zakaria

The greatest lesson we can learn from the past ... is that freedom is at the core of every successful nation in the world. — Frederick Chiluba

One's past can't be erased, it can only be learned from, the child taught her. — H. L. Balcomb

Don't just think about what you missed! Don't continue to dwell on your past mistakes. You shall also miss something in life, consciously or unconsciously! You shall never be able to do all things excellently in life though you must try to! The lesson from what you missed and its application for a better tomorrow is what matter! Move your thought! Move your body! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Every lesson you take from your past immediately turns into a stairs to the light! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

I don't spend much time regretting the past, once I've taken my lesson from it. I don't dwell on it. — Charlie Munger

yarn, n.

Maybe language is kind, giving us these double meanings. Maybe it's trying to teach us a lesson, that we can always be two things at once.
Knit me a sweater out of your best stories. Not the day's petty injustices. Not the glimmer of a seven-eights-forgotten moment from your past. Not something that somebody said to somebody, who then told it to you. No, I want a yarn. It doesn't have to be true. — David Levithan

The lesson we have yet to learn from dogs, that could sustain us, is that having no apprehension of the past or future is not limiting but liberating. — Susan Orlean

The past that Southerners are forever talking about is not a dead past
it is a chapter from the legend that our kinfolks have told us, it is a living past, living for a reason. The past is a part of the present, it is a comfort, a guide, a lesson. — Ben Robertson

I, too, had set out to be remembered. I had wanted to create something permanent in my life- some proof that everything in its way mattered, that working hard mattered, that feeling things mattered, that even sadness and loss mattered, because it was all part of something that would live on. But I had also come to recognize that not everything needs to be durable. the lesson we have yet to learn from dogs, that could sustain us, is that having no apprehension of the past or future is not limiting but liberating. Rin Tin Tin did not need to be remembered in order to be happy; for him, it was always enough to have that instant when the sun was soft, when the ball was tossed and caught, when the beloved rubber doll was squeaked. Such a moment was complete in itself, pure and sufficient. — Susan Orlean

Will this generation be able to turn things around and learn a valuable lesson from all of this? I hope so, but I have my doubts. The damage has been done. And as a lifelong student of history, it's quite evident that human beings don't learn from the mistakes of past generations. — Aaron B. Powell

Sometimes, when we don't learn a lesson in life, it pops up repeatedly until we do. Might this person be giving you an opportunity to learn an unlearned lesson from the past? What lesson(s) might that be? — Liisa Kyle

Scratch a conservative and you find someone who prefers the past over any future. Scratch a liberal and find a closet aristocrat. It's true! Liberal governments always develop into aristocracies. The bureaucracies betray the true intent of people who form such governments. Right from the first, the little people who formed the governments which promised to equalize the social burdens found themselves suddenly in the hands of bureaucratic aristocracies. Of course, all bureaucracies follow this pattern, but what a hypocrisy to find this even under a communized banner. Ahhh, well, if patterns teach me anything it's that patterns are repeated. My oppressions, by and large, are no worse than any of the others and, at least, I teach a new lesson. - — Frank Herbert

America does not repel the past or what it has produced under its forms or amid other politics or the idea of castes or the old religions . . . . accepts the lesson with calmness ... is not so impatient as has been supposed that the slough still sticks to opinions and manners and literature while the life which served its requirements has passed into the new life of the new forms ... perceives that the corpse is slowly borne from the eating and sleeping rooms of the house ... perceives that it waits a little while in the door ... that it was fittest for its days ... that its action has descended to the stalwart and wellshaped heir who approaches ... and that he shall be fittest for his days. — Walt Whitman