Alex Haley Quotes

I'm the type that thinks if you don't learn from history, you're doomed to repeat it.

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

We can not escape history.

We cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves.... The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation.

Some say, 'Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.' I say, 'Those who ignore history are in for a big surprise.'

That is the supreme value of history. The study of it is the best guarantee against repeating it.

At fifty everyone has the face he deserves.

Ignorance is bliss, or so we're told. Personally, I find ignorance is also destiny.

In the end, human history is made up of all our decisions.

History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are and why we are the way we are.

There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.

In historical events great men — so-called — are but labels serving to give a name to the event, and like labels they have the least possible connection with the event itself. Every action of theirs, that seems to them an act of their own free will, is in an historical sense not free at all, but in bondage to the whole course of previous history, and predestined from all eternity.

History turns in one direction only, and you can't get it back. You can only draw conclusions.

History repeats itself because no one listens the first time.

History is the record of an encounter between character and circumstances.

Even the Gods Can't Change History

No people can live in the past - not even in its own past. But if it no longer has a link with its history, it must of necessity perish. Persia, crowded with hardship and glory, ordeals and hopes. With the help of the Almighty, the lessons of the past constitute the best guide for the citizens of the future.

More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.

Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it.

I think if we don't understand history, if we don't keep referring back to it, we become complacent. And complacency, as we all know, it leads to repeating history.

If you don't pay attention to history, you're destined to repeat it.

It is proverbial, of course, that man never learns from history, and, as a rule, in respect to a problem of the present, it can teach us simply nothing. The new must be made through untrodden regions, without suppositions, and often, unfortunately, without piety also.

One has to learn from history. Quite frankly, it is almost impossible to have a sense of vision without a sense of history. If history is learned, then it doesn't have to repeat itself over generations.

Everyone must learn from the past.

The saying, "Those that don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it" doesn't just apply to politicians and world leaders, it applies to all of us on a daily basis.