Every true history must force us to remember that the past was once as real as the present and as uncertain as the future.

Before modern times there was Walking, but not the perfection of Walking, because there was no tea.

Many who burnt heretics in the ordinary way of their business were otherwise excellent people.

And how fascinating history is - the long, variegated pageant of man's still continuing evolution of this strange planet, so much the most interesting of all the myriads of spinners through space.

What is easy to read has been difficult to write. The labour of writing and rewriting, correcting and recorrecting, is the due exacted by every good book from its author, even if he knows from the beginning exactly what he wants to say. A limpid style is invariably the result of hard labour, and the easily flowing connection of sentence with sentence and paragraph with paragraph has always been won by the sweat of the brow.

We are the children of the earth and removed from her our spirit withers.

The best job goes to the person who can get it done without passing the buck or coming back with excuses.