Paul Horgan Quotes

Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living.

I know that Europe's wonderful, yet something seems to lack;The Past is too much with her, and the people looking back.

The great eventful Present hides the Past; but through the din Of its loud life hints and echoes from the life behind steal in.

It's been my experience, Langford, that the past always has a way of returning. Those who don't learn, or can't remember it, are doomed to repeat it.

The past is our treasure. Its works, whether we know them or not, flourish in our lives with whatever strength they had. From it we draw provision for our journey, the collected wisdom whose harvests are all ours to reap and carry with us, though we may never live again in the fields that grew them.

There is no future for a people who deny their past.

Old events have modern meanings; only that survives of past history which finds kindred in all hearts and lives.

Far too often, when we think we are frightened by mystery, the fact is that we are haunted by history.

Science fiction is never about the future, in the same way history is rarely about the past: they're both parable formats for examining or commenting on the present.

If history is really relevant in today's world, the proposition doesn't command much respect. Perhaps the past is a different country, but if so no one much wants to travel there.

My country has no history, only a past.

The past was the past; there was no escaping your beginnings.

If we tried To sink the past beneath our feet, be sure The future would not stand.

History can't be left to fend for itself. For when it comes to history and beliefs and values, we turn our future on the lathe of the past.

The past is the place we view the present from as much as the other way around.

Respect the past; you never know how it may affect you.

A generation which ignores history has no past — and no future.

The past is strapped to our backs. We do not have to see it; we can always feel it.

You can hide memories, but you can’t erase the history that produced them.

Who can ever be alone for a moment in Italy? Every stone has a voice, every grain of dust seems instinct with spirit from the Past, every step recalls some line, some legend of long-neglected lore.

The past, as you suggest, is absolutely present at all times and the present is born from the past. I wouldn't want to suggest that the past determines the present.

The past is a life sentence, a blunt instrument aimed at tomorrow.

To reclaim our past and insist that it become a part of our human history is the task that lies before us. For the future requires that women, as well as men, shape the world destiny.

Civilization is an active deposit which is formed by the combustion of the Present with the Past. Neither in countries without a Present nor in those without a Past is it to be discovered.

Earth has scarcely an acre that does not remind us of actions that have long preceded our own, and its clustering tombstones loom up like reefs of the eternal shore, to show us where so many human barks have struck and gone down.