The task of the historian is to understand the peoples of the past better than they understand themselves. — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
“While there is battle and hatred men have eyes for nothing save the fact that the enemy is the cause of all the troubles;… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
The academic mind can eat away the very basis of its own assurance ... produce contortions when it tries to bend over backward ...… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
Very strange bridges are used to make the passage from one state of things to another; we may lose sight of them in our… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
But the greatest menace to our civilization today is the conflict between giant organized systems of self-righteousness - each system only too delighted to… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
“History is not the study of origins; rather it is the analysis of all the mediations by which the past was turned into our… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
In the last resort, sheer insight is the greatest asset of all. — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
The study of the past with one eye, so to speak, upon the present is the source of all sins and sophistries in history… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
“The raconteur knows too well that, if he investigates the truth of the matter, he is only too likely to lose his good story.” — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
Those people work more wisely who seek to achieve good in their own small corner of the world ... than those who are forever… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
The study of the past with one eye upon the present is the source of all sins and sophistries in history. It is the… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
About the scientific revolution: it "outshines everything since the rise of Christianity and reduces the Renaissance and Reformation to the rank of mere episodes". — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
It has been said that the historian is the avenger, and that standing as a judge between the parties and rivalries and causes of… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
Concerning alchemy it is more difficult to discover the actual state of things, in that the historians who specialise in this field seem sometimes… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
If history can do anything it is to remind us that all our judgments are merely relative to time and circumstance. — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
It is not a sin to introduce a personal bias that can be recognized and discounted. The sin in historical composition is the organization… — Herbert Butterfield Copy Share Image
