Fernand Braudel Quotes

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.

Can't disagree with the need for a grasp of history.

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

Whatever can be noted historically can be found within history.

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.

To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning.

I think you can learn from history.

It's very important to always put things in their historical contexts. It teaches important lessons about the country in question.

Most of us get our history through story.

I don't think you should ever run from history. You should learn from it and embrace it.

The illusion is that most of my work is simply about past events: a point in history and nothing else.

The way you 'take history' is also a way of 'making history.'

Even historians with knowledge of the event, and with the materials before them on which to form a judgment, see but little way into the causes and consequences of the great events in human history.

History is too serious to be left to historians.

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

One test of a great work of history is does it make you feel like you have lived through the period

A good history covers not only what was done, but the thought that went into the action. You can read the history of a country through its actions.

History is what we would make of it.

You must read history forward and not backward.

History is an instrument of the most genuine patriotic spirit

I write to learn the flow of history.

Histories are to educate so that we understand better for ourselves and for motivation.

Americans are in vital need of the instruction that historians can provide.

If you really think about it, if we begin to teach history exactly the way that it happened - good, bad, ugly, no matter what - I believe that we're going to find that we are closer, more connected than we are apart.

We learn from history. That's what it's all about.