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Past Quotes

“Absolutely. Regret is counterproductive. It's looking back on a past that you can't change. Questioning things as they occur can prevent regret in the future. I questioned a lot about my relationship with your father. People make spontaneous decisions based off of their hearts all the time. There's so much more to relationships than just love.”

PeopleHeartPastFatherDecisionRegretQuestioningLooking BackSpontaneousCan't ChangeCounterproductive
Book:Slammed
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“It has been the resolution of mankind in all ages of the world. No people, no age, ever threw away the fruits of past wisdom, or the enjoyment of present blessings, for visionary schemes of ideal perfection. It is the knowledge of the past, the actual infliction of the present, that has produced all changes, all innovations, and all improvements - not (as is pretended) the chimerical anticipation of possible advantages, but the intolerable pressure of long-established, notorious, aggravated, and growing abuses.”

PeopleWorldLongHas BeensAgePastGrowingMankindBlessingAdvantageIdealsPerfectionAbusePressureInnovationFruitImprovementEnjoymentResolutionAnticipationSchemesVisionariesNotoriousAggravatedInflictionKnowledge Of The Past
Book:Delphi Collected Works of William Hazlitt (Illustrated)
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“May it not be asked of every intelligent friend to the liberties of his country, whether the power exercised in such an act as this ought not to produce great and universal alarm? Whether a rigid execution of such an act, in time past, would not have repressed that information and communication among the people which is indispensable to the just exercise of their electoral rights? And whether such an act, if made perpetual, and enforced with rigor, would not, in time to come, either destroy our free system of government, or prepare a convulsion that might prove equally fatal to it?”

PeopleIfsMayMadeCountryGovernmentMightPastLibertyRightsInformationProduceCommunicationOughtExerciseProveUniversalConstitutionIntelligentPerpetualExecutionIndispensableAlarmsRepressedRigorSystems Of GovernmentTimes PastInformation And Communication
Book:The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution: As Recommended by the General Convention at Philadelphia in 1787. Together with the Journal of the Federal Convention, Luther Martin's Letter, Yates's Minutes, Congressional Opinions, Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of '98-'99, and Other Illustrations of the Constitution
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“In my photographic work I'm generally attracted to places that contain memories, history, atmospheres and stories. I'm interested in the places where people have lived, worked and played. I look for traces of the past, visual fingerprints, evidence of activities - they fire my imagination and connect into my own personal experiences. Using the analogy of the theater, I would say that I like to photograph the empty stage, before or after the performance, even in between acts. I love the atmosphere of anticipation, the feeling in the air that events have happened, or will happen soon.”

PeopleLooksStoriesFeelingsHappensPastImaginationMemoriesMy OwnFireHappenedAirStageEventsActivityEvidenceEmptyPerformancesTheaterPhotographerPhotographAtmosphereVisualsAnticipationMy ImaginationAnalogiesPersonal ExperiencesFingerprintsEmpty Stage
Author:Michael Kenna
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“Science fiction is the branch of literature that deals with the effects of change on people in the real world as it can be projected into the past, the future, or to distant places. It often concerns itself with scientific or technological change, and it usually involves matters whose importance is greater than the individual or the community; often civilization or the race itself is in danger.”

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Book:Road to Science Fiction 2
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“Every historian loves the past or should do. If not, he has mistaken his vocation; but it is a short step from loving the past to regretting that it has ever changed. Conservatism is our greatest trade-risk; and we run psychoanalysts close in the belief that the only "normal" people are those who cause no trouble either to themselves or anybody else.”

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Author:A. J. P. Taylor
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“For who can wonder that man should feel a vague belief in tales of disembodied spirits wandering through those places which they once dearly affected, when he himself, scarcely less separated from his old world than they, is for ever lingering upon past emotions and bygone times, and hovering, the ghost of his former self, about the places and people that warmed his heart of old?”

PeopleMenWorldFeelsShouldHeartSelfPastSpiritBeliefEmotionWonderGhostTalesWanderFormerAffectedVagueSpookyOld WorldLingeringHovering
Book:The Mystery of Edwin Drood and Other Stories
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“In the Eleusinian mysteries, they would always warn people, "if you go in here, your ego will die. You're going to have to confront all your past hang-ups, strip them off, and be a changed person." One emperor of Rom who wanted to be initiated in the Eleusinian mysteries said, "That's interesting, I approve of what you're doing, but I don't want to be changed.”

PeopleIfsWantPersonsSaidWantedPastDiesInterestingMysteryChangedEgoOur PastYour PastEmperorHang UpsChanged Person
Book:Your Brain Is God
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“In times of war, as everyone knows, who has lived through one, or talked to soldiers when they are allowing themselves to remember the truth, and not the sentimentalities with which we all shield ourselves from the horrors of which we are capable ... in times of war we revert, as a species, to the past, and are permitted to be brutal and cruel. It is for this reason, and of course others, that a great many people enjoy war. But this is one of the facts about war that is not often talked about.”

PeopleKnowsWarReasonFactsPastRememberCoursesEnjoyHorrorCapableSpeciesSoldierGreat MenAllowingBrutalShieldsSentimentality
Author:Doris Lessing
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“I don't have a preference for bad people, no. I have an interest in playing a broad range of characters. Obviously, I'm mostly identified with a character who is very responsible, very solid and very intelligent, but there are plenty of questionable characters in my past career. I'm interested in exploring theatricality and characters with some dimension.”

PeopleCharacterPastInterestCareersIntelligentResponsiblePlentyRangeDimensionsBroadsExploringPreferenceBad PeopleMy PastQuestionable
Author:Leonard Nimoy
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“Stop watering things that were never meant to grow in your life. Water what works, what's good, what's right. Stop playing around with those dead bones and stuff you can't fix, its over...leave it alone! You're coming into a season of greatness. If you water what's alive and divine, you will see harvest like you've never seen before. Stop wasting water on dead issues, dead relationships, dead people, a dead past. No matter how much you water concrete, you can't grow a garden.”

PeopleIfsMatterPastGrowsStuffWaterIssuesAliveGreatnessDivineLike YouGardenSeasonsBonesConcreteHarvestDead PeoplePlaying Around
Author:T. D. Jakes
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“Words, English words, are full of echoes, of memories, of associations. They have been out and about, on people's lips, in their houses, in the streets, in the fields, for so many centuries. And that is one of the chief difficulties in writing them today -- that they are stored with other meanings, with other memories, and they have contracted so many famous marriages in the past.”

PeopleWritingHas BeensTodayPastHouseMemoriesMarriageStreetsCenturyFieldsDifficultyLipsChiefsAssociationEchoesEnglish Words
Author:Virginia Woolf
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“It is sometimes said that because of our past we, as a people, expect too much and set our sights too high. That is not the way I see it. Rather it seems to me that throughout my life in politics our ambitions have steadily shrunk. Our response to disappointment has not been to lengthen our stride but to shorten the distance to be covered. But with confidence in ourselves and in our future what a nation we could be!”

PeopleWaySaidSometimesSeemsPastNationsToo MuchAmbitionSightDistanceResponseDisappointmentCoveredOur FutureOur PastStride
Author:Margaret Thatcher
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“There's no doubt that I really have a feeling for the theater. These past few days it has occurred to me to do a comedy whose chief characters are photographic enlargements. Those people we see in doorways. Newlyweds, sergeants, dead girls, an anonymous crowd full of mustaches and wrinkles. It should be terrible. If I focus it well, it will possess pathos without consolation. In the midst of those people I will place an authentic fairy.”

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Author:Federico Garcia Lorca
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“The people of America are red, white, black, yellow, and all the shades in between. Their eyes are blue, black, and brown, and all the shades in between. Their hair is straight, curly, kinky, and most of it in between. They are tall and short, slim and fat, athletic and anaemic, and most of them in between. They are the different peoples of the world becoming more and more the "in between." They are a people creating a new bridge of mankind in between the past of narrow nationalistic chauvinism and the horizon of a new mankind--a people of the world. Their face is the face of the future.”

PeopleWorldDifferentEyeAmericaPastFacesBlackWhiteMankindHairBecomingCreatingRedBlueFatsBridgesBrownTallHorizonShadeYellowAthleticDifferent PeoplesBecoming MoreSlimKinkyChauvinismNationalistic
Book:Reveille for Radicals
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“The American people were, in the beginning, Revolutionaries and Tories. The American people ever since have been Revolutionaries and Tories. They have been Revolutionaries and Tories regardless of the labels of the past and present. Regardless of whether they were Federalists, Democrat-Republicans, Whigs, Know-Nothings, Free Soilers, Unionists or Confederates, Populists, Republicans, Democrats, Socialists, Communists, or Progressives. They have been and are profiteers and patriots. They have been and are conservatives, liberals, and radicals.”

PeopleKnowsHas BeensPastRepublicanDemocratRadicalLabelsRevolutionaryCommunistPatriotPast And PresentPopulistFederalistConfederate
Author:Saul Alinsky
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“What joins the Americans one to another is not a common ancestry, language or race, but a shared work of the imagination that looks forward to the making of a future, not backward to the insignia of the past. Their enterprise is underwritten by a Constitution that allows for the widest horizons of sight and the broadest range of expression, supports the liberties of the people as opposed to the ambitions of the state, and stands as premise for a narrative rather than plan for an invasion or a monument. The narrative was always plural; not one story, many stories.”

PeopleLooksStatesStoriesAmericaPastLanguageImaginationCommonRaceLibertySupportPlansExpressionAmbitionSightConstitutionNarrativeRangeEnterpriseHorizonMonumentInvasionPremisesAncestry
Author:Lewis H. Lapham
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“If we have learned anything in the past ten years, it is that these lovely things about America were never lovely. We have been expansionist and aggressive and mean to other people from the beginning. And we've been aggressive and mean to people in this country, and we've allocated the wealth of this country in a very unjust way. We've never had justice in our courts for the poor people, for black people, for radicals. Now how can we boast that America is a very special place? It's not that special. It really isn't.”

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Author:Howard Zinn
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“I've had a lot of people in my past who were friends with me just to get publicity. When I was young, my mom or sister used to have to point out if someone was using me to make a name for themselves – you know, linking arms with me on the red carpet and trying to get in every picture. But now I can see for myself when someone is just hungry for attention.”

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Author:Paris Hilton
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“To the extent that sacrifices need to be made, shouldn't the people who've made out like bandits this past generation be first in line? The problem with getting out of the slump is that we need to spend more. It's not that somebody needs to spend less. We have idle workers who have the skills and the willingness to work. We have idle factories. Dealing with this is not about saying somebody needs to suffer. It's saying that we need to be prepared to open the taps.”

PeopleNeedsFirstsMadeProblemPastSufferingLinesGenerationsSacrificeSkillsPreparedWorkersWillingnessFactoriesIdleBe PreparedBanditsSlumpsPast Generations
Author:Paul Krugman
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“Were it not for Occam's Razor, which always demands simplicity, I'd be tempted to believe that human beings are more influenced by distant causes than immediate ones. This would especially be true of overeducated people, who are capable of thinking past the immediate, of becoming obsessed by the remote. It's the old stuff, the conflicts we've never come to terms with, that sneaks up on us, half forgotten, insisting upon action.”

PeopleThinkingBelieveHumansActionPastCausesStuffTermHuman BeingsHalfBecomingDemandConflictCapableSimplicityForgottenBeing TrueObsessedTemptedSneakRazorsInsistingOld StuffOccam's Razor
Author:Richard Russo
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“My grandfather was a most gifted person, and amongst his many qualities, one of them had always particularly impressed me. While the past was a book he had read and re-read may times, the future was just one more literary work of art into which he used to pour himself with deep thought and concentration. Innumerable people since his death have told me how he used to read in the future, and this certainly was one of his very great strengths.”

PeopleMayPersonsArtBookPastUsedQualityJust OneConcentrationWorks Of ArtGrandfatherImpressedGiftedDeep ThoughtMy GrandfatherLiterary Works
Author:Aga Khan IV
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“Children must be free to think in all directions irrespective of the peculiar ideas of parents who often seal their children's minds with preconceived prejudices and false concepts of past generations. Unless we are very careful, very careful indeed, and very conscientious, there is still great danger that our children may turn out to be the same kind of people we are.”

PeopleThinkingMindKindMayChildrenStillsIdeasPastTurnsParentGenerationsDangerConceptsPrejudiceOur ChildrenCarefulPeculiarSealsPast Generations
Author:Brock Chisholm
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“Sometimes we say we want an end to hate or racism or sexism. But we all participate in keeping these structures alive. If everyone decided to relinquish the past what would happen to people who feel that there hasn't been proper atonement made to them? And what happens to the person who feels that the constant atonement is their identity?”

PeopleIfsWantFeelsPersonsMadeEndsSometimesHappensPastHateAliveIdentityRacismDecidedStructureConstantSexismAtonement
Author:Chris Abani
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“You know, people see [August: Osage County], and I tell them that it's based on my family, and they assume that I came from some kind of horrible, hysterical circumstances. That's not true. My family, my nuclear family, was actually very close. My mom and dad were great parents and they encouraged a real rich, creative life for me and my brothers. My extended family, like every family, has some darkness, and some violence of some kind, emotional or otherwise, in their past.”

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Author:Tracy Letts
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“Reality looks much more obvious in hindsight than in foresight. People who experience hindsight bias misapply current hindsight to past foresight. They perceive events that occurred to have been more predictable before the fact than was actually the case.”

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Book:Beyond Greed and Fear: Understanding Behavioral Finance and the Psychology of Investing
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