Quotes about Past

Scratch a conservative and you find someone who prefers the past over any future. Scratch a liberal and find a closet aristocrat.

Paul Tillich once defined forgiveness as remembering the past in order that it might be forgotten—a principle that applies to nations as well as individuals.

Worry is a waste of energy. It cant change the past. It cant control the future. It only makes today miserable

Wherever biblical writers talk about the past, we should expect them to be shaping the past as well.

But past who can recall, or don undoe? Not God Omnipotent, nor Fate

She had an immense store of trivial memories and when she wasn't living in the future she was living in the past. As for the present—she got through that as quickly as she could, running away from things, running towards things, so that her voice was always a little breathless, her heart pounding at an escape or an expectation.

Over the years I've grown more and more convinced that "storytelling" is a better way of understanding what the Bible is doing with the past than "history writing.

People are always shouting they want to create a better future. It's not true. The future is an apathetic void of no interest to anyone. The past is full of life, eager to irritate us, provoke and insult us, tempt us to destroy or repaint it. The only reason people want to be masters of the future is to change the past.

Even in times past, while Saul was king, you were the one who led Israel out and brought them back. And the LORD your God said, ‘You will shepherd My people Israel, and you will be ruler over them.’”

No amount of regret changes the past. No amount of anxiety changes the future. Any amount of grateful joy changes the present.

What happens to what's happened? she asked the bishop. It's there. Waiting. But the time gate's closed, isn't it? Yes. But that can't take away what we've had. The good and the bad.

For 'historical' means 'subject to time' (p. 242).