#historian

The historian is, by definition, absolutely incapable of observing the facts which he examines. ↗

— Marc Bloch

#definition #examines #facts #historian #incapable

A good historian is timeless; although he is a patriot, he will never flatter his country in any respect. ↗

— Francois Fenelon

#any #country #flatter #good #his

What is a historian, anyway? It is someone who uses facts to record the development of humanity. ↗

— Lion Feuchtwanger

#development #facts #historian #humanity #record

In taking action we must remember that the things which are happening to the Jews today are but a part of the general disintegration anticipated by philosophers and historians of different schools for almost half a century. ↗

— Louis Finkelstein

#almost #anticipated #century #different #different schools

The historian must have some conception of how men who are not historians behave. Otherwise he will move in a world of the dead. He can only gain that conception through personal experience, and he can only use his personal experiences when he is a genius. ↗

— E. M. Forster

#conception #dead #experience #experiences #gain

The way in which mathematicians and physicists and historians talk is quite different, and what a physicist means by physical intuition and what a mathematician means by beauty or elegance are things worth thinking about. ↗

— Clifford Geertz

#beauty #different #elegance #historians #intuition

How well Shakespeare knew how to improve and exalt little circumstances, when he borrowed them from circumstantial or vulgar historians. ↗

— Horace Walpole

#circumstances #exalt #historians #how #improve

For ignorance is the first requisite of the historian──ignorance, which simplifies and clarifies, which selects and omits, with a placid perfection that unattainable by the highest art. ↗

— Lytton Strachey

#ignorance #art

The man who first gave history a recognized place in science was an ancient historian. ↗

— James H. Breasted

#first #gave #historian #history #man

God cannot alter the past, though historians can. ↗

— Samuel Butler

#alter #cannot #god #historians #past