No nation in the world has so many drastic problems squeezed into so small a space, under such urgent pressure of time and heavy burden of history, as Israel.

Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves; the bad times in history come when they cannot.

To rush in upon an event before its significance has had time to separate from the surrounding circumstances may be enterprising, but is it useful? ... The recent prevalence of these hot histories on publishers' lists raises the question: Should - or perhaps can - history be written while it is still smoking?

The story and study of the past, both recent and distant, will not reveal the future, but it flashes beacon lights along the way and it is a useful nostrum against despair.

Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled.

To a historian libraries are food, shelter, and even muse.

The better part of valor is to spend it learning to live with differences, however hostile, unless and until we can find another planet.