Disaster is rarely as pervasive as it seems from recorded accounts. The fact of being on the record makes it appear continuous and ubiquitous whereas it is more likely to have been sporadic both in time and place.
BARBARA TUCHMANGovernment remains the paramount area of folly because it is there that men seek power over others – only to lose it over themselves.
More Barbara Tuchman Quotes
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Theology being the work of males, original sin was traced to the female.
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The nastiness of women [in the 14th century] was generally perceived at the close of life when a man began to worry about hell, and his sexual desire in any case fading.
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One must stop conducting research before one has finished. Otherwise, one will never stop and never finish.
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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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Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill.
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Doctrine tied itself into infinite knots over the realities of sex.
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The power to command frequently causes failure to think.
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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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Whatever solace the Christian faith could give was balanced by the anxiety it generated.
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Books are the carriers of civilization… Books are humanity in print.
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The ills and disorders of the 14th century could not be without consequence. Times were to grow worse over the next fifty-odd years until at some imperceptible moment, by the some mysterious chemistry, energies were refreshed, ideas broke out of the mold of the Middle Ages into new realms, and humanity found itself redirected.
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Honor wears different coats to different eyes.
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I want the reader to turn the page and keep on turning to the end.
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If wisdom in government eludes us, perhaps courage could substitute-the moral courage to terminate mistakes.
BARBARA TUCHMAN -
satire is a wrapping of exaggeration around a core of reality.
BARBARA TUCHMAN






