Golda Meir Quotes

Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

An accurate knowledge of the past of a country is necessary for everyone who would understand its present, and who desires to judge of its future.

We must delve deep into history the better to engage a true dialogue of civilisations. Fear of the present can impose upon the past its own biased vision.

I really feel sorry for kids who aren't interested in history - recent history, either, because it is this that made us what we are.

It may be enough to study history in all its nuance and ambiguity for its own sake. But there is no country free of the need to find new ways of reading the past as an inspiring way of thinking about everything else, including the present.

The task of understanding the past is neverending.

History is a battleground... but it has always been the case. Remembering is a radical act. Choosing what is important and what belongs in the overstuffed metaphorical dustbin of history is of vital importance.

History is the present. That's why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product.

Our understanding of the thought of the past is liable to be the more adequate, the less the historian is convinced of the superiority of his own point of view, or the more he is prepared to admit the possibility that he may have to learn something, not merely about the thinkers of the past, but from them.

Writing history is writing the soul of the past...

Every film that is made about the past is always a reflection of the present.

History justifies whatever we want it to. It teaches absolutely nothing, for it contains everything and gives examples of everything.

We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.

The power of historical fiction for bad and for good can be immense in shaping consciousness of the past.

Like the philosopher, the author views his task as one of establishing a clear connection between life and history, and of making the past bear fruit for the present and future.

I'm interested in history, in trying to relate the past to the present and to understand how people thought about their problems and pleasures.

While writing books about the past, I think about the present. It's not intentional, but somehow my books end up being written under the sign of a political mood.

Most of us, I think, are conscious of history swirling around outside the door, but when we're in the house, we're usually not dealing with history. We're not thinking about history.

I believe that patterns tend to repeat themselves and there are connections between the past and the present. There is the old proverb that reads, 'You can't know where you're going if you don't know where you've been'. For me, history is like that. When you take history and combine it with myth, then you get mystery.

History is nothing but gossip about the past, with the hope that it might be true.

The past has to inform the present.

Well goodness knows, goodness knows what historians will write.

I think history is continuous. It doesn't begin or end on Pearl Harbor Day or the day Lyndon Johnson withdraws from the presidency or on 9/11. You have to learn from the past but not be imprisoned by it. You need to take counsel of history but never be imprisoned by it.

If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.

Wisely used history can give pleasure and provide us with a useful tool; but we should not become its slaves.