Action Quote by Ariel Durant

The present enables us to understand the past, not the other way round.

— A. J. P. Taylor

You have to know the past to understand the present.

— Carl Sagan

The past is what the present is doing now.

— Rowan Williams

The present is the key to the past

— Charles Lyell

The present is determined by our past actions, and the future by the present.

— Swami Vivekananda

The past assumes the nature of the present.

— Oliver Stone

The present, like a note in music, is nothing but as it appertains to what is past and what is to come.

— Walter Savage Landor

The present contains nothing more than the past, and what is found in the effect was already in the cause.

— Henri Bergson

When the past is forgotten, the present is unforgettable

— Martin Amis

Understanding the past requires pretending that you don't know the present.

— Paul Fussell

The present is only understandable through the past, with which it forms a living continuity; and the past is always grasped from our own…

— Terry Eagleton

We must not confuse the present with the past. With regard to the past, no further action is possible.

— Simone de Beauvoir