"History is the long struggle of man, by the exercise of his reason, to understand his environment and to act upon it. But the modern period has broadened the struggle in a revolutionary way. Man now seeks to understand, and to act on, not only his environment, but himself; and this has added, so to speak, a new dimension to reason, and a new dimension to history. The present age is the most historically minded of all ages. Modern man is to an unprecedented degree self-conscious and therefore conscious of history. He peers eagerly back into the twilight out of which he has come in the hope that its faint beams will illuminate the obscurity into which he is going; and, conversely, his aspirations and anxieties about the path that lies ahead quicken his insight into what lies behind. Past, present and future are linked together in the endless chain of history."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Historians from EnglandDiplomats of the United KingdomUniversity of Cambridge facultyNon-fiction authors from EnglandJournalists from England
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Chap. 6 : The Widening Horizon
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/E._H._Carr
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
E. H. Carr
Edward Hallett "Ted" Carr, CBE (28 June 1892 – 3 November 1982) was an English historian, diplomat, journalist and international relations theorist.
22 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by E. H. Carr →
Related Quotes
"The historian and the facts of history are necessary to one another. The historian without his facts is rootless and …"
"The historian, then, is an individual human being. Like other individuals, he is also a social phenomenon, both the p…"
"History, then, in both senses of the word – meaning both the enquiry conducted by the historian and the facts of the …"
"It is nonsense to say that generalization is foreign to history; history thrives on generalizations."
"Recognition of the truth behind the over-statements of revolutionary propaganda has long penetrated to circles which …"
"Scientists, social scientists and historians are all engaged in different branches of the same study: the study of ma…"
"History therefore is a process of selection in terms of historical significance. To borrow Talcott Parsons’s phrase o…"
"Facts cannot be derived from values. This is partly true, but may also be misleading, and requires qualification. Whe…"
"History properly so-called can be written only by those who find and accept a sense of direction in history itself. T…"
"The vogue of Marxism in Great Britain and France, which began on a modest scale after the success of the Bolshevik re…"