The essential matter of history is not what happened but what people thought or said about it.
quote by Frederic William Maitland

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Related quotes
The Deep South has a completely different history, both good and bad, that is fascinating for everybody. It makes people work together who usually don't, and that sounds like a cliche in so many ways, but it actually happened... and it happened because of a beautiful idea.
quote by Genevieve Gorder

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Something Happened
Something happened
I just don't understand
Something happened
It's making me feel mad
Something happened, you don't hear about
Oh, please that never did before
Something happened
I just don't understand
Something happened
I just don't understand
Something happened
It's making me feel mad, oh
I never saw this on TV
I never read it in no book
ahh
Something happened
I just don't understand
hey, baby, something happened
I just don't understand
something happened
I just don't understand
something happened
I just don't understand
something happened
I just don't understand
something happened
Something happened
I just don't understand
Something happened
It's making me feel mad
I thought I knew a lot of things
but I don't know a thing, oh, oh, oh
Something happened
I just don't understand
The things I hear and see
don't seem the same
The things I touch and feel
are forever changed
I've never felt this way before
and I hope I never do again
Something happened
I don't know why or when
oh, something happened
I just don't understand
something happened
I just don't understand
Doo, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo
something happened
Doo, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo
something happened
Doo, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo
something happened
Doo, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-doo
song performed by by Lou Reed

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Survive
Whatever happened to you
The one that was so beautiful
I could count on you to make my life a little brighter
I always thought you were built to last
But I never saw anything fall apart so fast
You were born in freedom
To be a slave to your inhibitions
Inventing excuses and proving the right to back up your condition
But a soul like that aint tied too tight
And its liable to scatter all over the night
Seasons change
Some people get old and die
Great cities are built up and torn down
But I see youre still alive
Seasons change
Some people get old and die
Great cities are built up and torn down
So how could you survive
Im not asking for much
Only for time to stop
And history to go unrecorded
And people not to be people
People not to be people
People not to be people
People not to be people not to b
song performed by by Hall & Oates

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It is essential that we enable young people to see themselves as participants in one of the most exciting eras in history, and to have a sense of purpose in relation to it.
quote by Nelson Rockefeller

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Most importantly, nothing has happened to change my conviction that freedom and the love of liberty remain the essential defining attributes of our national character as a people.
quote by Ibrahim Babangida

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Nothing in the reporting of a nation's history could so mislead the younger generation as to represent great events in such a way that they appear to have happened as a matter of course.
quote by Gustav Stresemann

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Sister Love
I know we're not sisters
But it seems like we are
We have a special bond
No matter how far
As I grew up
You were always there
No matter what happened
You were always near
When I was little
This was my thought
We're not real sisters
But you're the closest I've got
That thought's still here
And it always will be
But with our baby sister
We're a group of three
But now I know
You'll always care
Though things seem different
This bond we will share
With you as a sister
We did everything sisters could do
So no matter near or far
Our sister love is true
poem by Ariana Love

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There are eras of human history in which the channels of thought have been too deeply cut and no change was possible, and nothing new ever happened, and "best" was a matter of dogma, but that is not the situation now. Now the stream of our common consciousness seems to be obliterating its own banks, losing its central direction and purpose, flooding the lowlands, disconnecting and isolating the highlands and to no particular purpose other than the wasteful fulfillment of its own internal momentum. Some channel deepening seems called for.
quote by Robert M. Pirsig

Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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All About History
History is the past
What do we need it for?
Time runs out real fast
Who cares what happened before? !
Princes who were wed
Forget what your teacher said
No need to fill your head
With people who are dead
Why do we need to know
Let them rest in peace
They died and we will so
From books their lives release
i wrote this one in a history exam (i didnt have anything else to do)
The Husband And Wife
What ever happened to the husband and wife
What ever happened to love
What ever happened to the dreams they thought right
That they both thought so much of
What ever happened to the holding of hands
Or the whispers of secrets to keep
Did it somehow slip away with the time
Is it somewhere still hidden beneath
What ever happened to the words I do
Replaced now with words of cruel
Does somehow it still linger on
Is love only lost and confused
What ever happened to the romance
And the love that was in each breath we took
Must somehow be forgotten now
Was this in the chances we took
What ever happened to the husband and wife
What ever happened to love
What will now happen to the rest of our lives
For love, was it overlooked
What will now happen to the dreams we once had
When the world was right at our feet
Is love somehow still hidden somewhere
Or is this the way it must be
There once was a time when it meant so much more
When love walked with us in life
What ever happened to the love in our hearts
What happened to the husband and wife.
copyright 2004 Bill Simmons
aka [email protected]
poem by Bill Simmons

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Papa Hegel he say that all we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history. I know people who can't even learn from what happened this morning. Hegel must have been taking the long view.
quote by John Brunner

Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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I Can't For The Life of me Spell Holocaust
i'm being honest,
really i can't. i don't know how to spell it.
i know that it was horrible,
and it killed part of my family
in an excruciating, only-human way.
i know that it was specifically
one man's fault in history books,
and millions of people's on the DL.
if it happened here,
i cannot say it wouldn't be the same.
i can't, i'm being honest with you.
look around you at the world you see,
if a holocaust happened
wherever you are in this crazy world...
wouldn't it be the same?
In the end, who will you be?
everyone has a choice to make.
poem by David Thomas

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To You
Well if the same thing happened to you
Would you still put me through what you put me through?
If it happened to you. what if it happened to you?
What if it happened a man kept shaking you down
But you cant get a ride to his side of town?
If it happened to you. what if it happened to you?
What if happened to you? keep it out of my shoes.
And if youre stepping on toes, keep it outta my nose.
cos if the same thing happened to me
Well, it wont be as bad as it used to be.
If it happened toyou. what if it happened to you?
What if it happened to you?
What if it happened to you?
What if it happened to you, too?
What if it happens to you?
What if it happens to you?
What if happens to you? keep it out of my shoes.
And if youre stepping on toes, keep it outta my nose.
cos if the same thing happened to me
Well, it wont be as bad as it used to be.
If it happened to you. what if it happened to you?
What if it happened to you?
What am I going to do?
What if it happened to you?
Well, what if happened to you?
* repeat until fade: what if happened to you?
song performed by by Paul McCartney

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there.
quote by George Santayana

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Were History
You look to me for some outstanding meaning
You got the devil in your eyes and nothing in your soul
If you think Im gonna sell myself, then you must be dreaming
Theres no way, Im gonna fall into your hole
You never seem to help me when Im bleeding
You gotta knife for a tongue and youre tearing at my heart
I thought you were a friend, but in truth you never liked me
You lied and cheated us from the start
You are wrong, love doesnt last forever
Youre nothing new there is no mystery
Now youre gone you thought you were so clever
You and me are now history, were history...
Solo
I dont like your face
I dont like your eyes
I dont like your lips, I hate your lies
This times the last time its goodbye time
You are wrong, love doesnt last forever
Youre nothing new there is no mystery
Now youre gone you thought you were so clever
You and me are now history, were history...
Were history, were history
I dont need you and I dont care
Were history, were history...
song performed by by U. D. O.

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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In man - in the history of mankind, this has happened many times, and occupation leaders hang on to the land that they're occupying. People fight to liberate their land. But in the end, the people's will is what achieves victory.
quote by Hassan Nasrallah

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That's history. I say history because it happened in the past.
quote by Murray Walker

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Where Do I Come From?
Where do I come from? I do not know,
For it was taken away before I could see. What
is my name? I do not know, because it was taken
away from me before I was born. Who am I? I will never know, for the
culture of who I am and would have been, was
stripped away from lack of understanding. What is my past?
The knowledge to know that people, doing the hating
and despising are the very same people that share
my family roots. Who am I? This I do know a person that
will never have knowledge, of what it would be
like to have a culture and a country, a past with
a positive history! Where do I go? I do not know, for there
is far more prejudice than ever against a people,
with no country and no culture, stuck in the middle
of a melting pot society. What do I do? All I can do is hope,
hope that one day, it won't matter what color
you are, and it won't matter where you come from.
It doesn't matter what you look like, that people
wake up and accept a person by how one is treated. What is my future?
To pass this knowledge to my children, for it
is the only thing left, that was not taken from me.
And it is the only thing of value in this life
I can give, this gift to my child.
poem by Be' Ver Lee Houston

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Oh My What A Shame
They were married in the old church yard
and they promised to be true to each other
no matter how hard their lives might be
but like meteors that fell through moments parallel
they were soon to cross and on different plots of earth
they both did fall
Though their lives had really not been hard at all
Oh my, what a shame no one's to blame
it just happened that way and there is nothing you can say
when two people say good-bye
Oh my
Two brothers promised they'd return
when the war that they were fighting was over
but only one lived to keep his vow
and the story I was told said he lived to be quite old
before time won out, someone asked if he knew what they both
fought for, but he could not recall he'd ever been to war
Oh my, what a shame no one's to blame
it just happened that way and there is nothing you can say
when two people say good-bye
Oh my
For there's nothing you can say when it's over
And there's nothing you can do when it's done
there's no battle you can win
and there's nothing to begin that's not begun
In this moment, I recall your face and I wonder if you still
think about me, occasionally I still think of you
and I watch the river flow and I know I must let go
but it's oh so hard for the waves are all around my small canoe
I had always hoped this boat could carry two
Oh my, what a shame no one's to blame
it just happened that way and there is nothing you can say
when two people say good-bye
Oh my
song performed by by Don McLean

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Keeping Dates And Times
What do you mean,
I never listen to you?
I'm always listening to you.
In fact...
Some of the most memorable conversations,
You have initiated.
'But...
Why do you interrupt me so often? '
Wait a minute.
The only time I do not interrupt you,
Is when you have something brilliant to say.
So don't sit here trying to convince me...
Or yourself,
I do not pay you any attention.
You have no idea how much I do!
'When was the last time you thought I said anything,
That was brilliant? '
Are we going to have a conversation or not?
Now you want to test my history knowledge.
You know I don't do well with dates.
Or things that have happened in the past.
I just know these things have happened.
Keeping dates and times in my mind...?
I'm not into that.
That's just too detailed and time consuming.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar

Submitted by Poetry Lover
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