It is wiser, I believe, to arrive at theory by way of evidence rather than the other way around…. It is more rewarding, in any case, to assemble the facts first and, in the process of arranging them in narrative form, to discover a theory or a historical generalization emerging of its own accord.
BARBARA TUCHMANCompleteness is rare in history.
More Barbara Tuchman Quotes
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To explain strange and irregular phenomena of nature, haphazard events and, above all, irrational human conduct. They exist to bear the burden of all things that cannot be comprehended except by supernatural intervention or design.
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For most people reform meant relief from ecclesiastical extortions.
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No more distressing moment can ever face a British government than that which requires it to come to a hard, fast and specific decision.
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To put away one’s own original thoughts in order to take up a book is a sin against the Holy Ghost.
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Nothing is more satisfying than to write a good sentence.
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To gain victory over the flesh was the purpose of fasting and celibacy, which denied the pleasures of this world for the sake of reward in the next.
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What his imagination is to the poet, facts are to the historian. His exercise of judgment comes in their selection, his art in their arrangement.
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Completeness is rare in history.
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Confronted by menace, or what is perceived as menace, governments will usually attempt to smash it, rarely to examine it, understand it, define it.
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More than a code of manners in war and love, Chivalry was a moral system, governing the whole of noble life.
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No economic activity was more irrepressible [in the 14th century] than the investment and lending at interest of money; it was the basis for the rise of the Western capitalist economy and the building of private fortunes-and it was based on the sin of usury.
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The poets have familiarized more people with history than have the historians.
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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.
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In the search for meaning we must not forget that the gods (or God, for that matter) are a concept of the human mind; they are the creatures of man, not vice versa. They are needed and invented to give meaning and purpose to the struggle that is life on Earth.
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Arguments can always be found to turn desire into policy.
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Human beings of any age need to approve of themselves; the bad times in history come when they cannot.
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The open frontier, the hardships of homesteading from scratch, the wealth of natural resources.
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I have always felt like an artist when I work on a book. I see no reason why the word should always be confined to writers of fiction and poetry.
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An essential element for good writing is a good ear: One must listen to the sound of one’s own prose.
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Doctrine tied itself into infinite knots over the realities of sex.
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I ask myself, have nations ever declined from a loss of moral sense rather than from physical reasons or the pressure of barbarians? I think that they have.
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Woman was the Church’s rival, the temptress, the distraction, the obstacle to holiness, the Devil’s decoy.
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Voluntary self-directed religion was more dangerous to the Church than any number of infidels.
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Vainglory, however, no matter how much medieval Christianity insisted it was a sin, is a motor of mankind, no more eradicable than sex.
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Business offers a kind of power, but only to the very successful at the top, and without the dominion and titles and red carpets and motorcycle escorts of public office.
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Honor wears different coats to different eyes.
BARBARA TUCHMAN