“History does not repeat itself except with variations, and it is idle to look for exact parallels, but we can trace a resemblance between the conditions of his time and those of to-day.”
Augustus (1937)
Context: History does not repeat itself except with variations, and it is idle to look for exact parallels, but we can trace a resemblance between the conditions of his time and those of to-day. Once again the crust of civilization has worn thin, and beneath can be heard the muttering of primeval fires. Once again many accepted principles of government have been overthrown, and the world has become a laboratory where immature and feverish minds experiment with unknown forces. Once again problems cannot be comfortably limited, for science has brought the nations into an uneasy bondage to each other. In the actual business of administration there is no question of today which Augustus had not to face and answer.
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John Buchan 145
British politician 1875–1940Related quotes
“History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme.”
Origins unclear. Earliest known match in print comes from 1970, in a collection called “Neo Poems” by Canadian artist John Robert Colombo, who recalled reading it sometime in the 1960s. Twain did say "History never repeats itself, but the Kaleidoscopic combinations of the pictured present often seem to be constructed out of the broken fragments of antique legends." in the 1874 edition of “The Gilded Age: A Tale of To-Day”. A thematic precursor, "History May Not Repeat, But It Looks Alike", appears in a 1941 article by Chicago Tribune in Illinois. (Source: Quote Investigator https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/01/12/history-rhymes/)
Misattributed
“It is the soothing thing about history that it does repeat itself.”
Wars I Have Seen (1945)
“History repeats itself all the time on Wall Street.”
Source: Reminiscences of a Stock Operator (1923), Chapter XVIII, p. 217
"Ten Variable Stars of the Algol Type" (1908) Annals of the Astronomical Observatory of Harvard College Vol.60. No.5
Observing the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, December 7 1991 http://www.navy.mil/navco/pages/2001/01pg-017-ph-bush120791.htm
“History repeats itself: historians repeat each other.”
" Some Historians http://books.google.com/books?id=E0luAAAAMAAJ&q=%22History+repeats+itself+historians+repeat+each+other%22&pg=PA20#v=onepage," Supers & Supermen: Studies in Politics, History and Letters (1920)
Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995)
"Bacon's Religion," p. 293
An Examination of the Philosophy of Francis Bacon (1836)
“We cannot forget what had happened and history should not repeat itself.”
As quoted in Pioneers of Modern China : Understanding the Inscrutable Chinese (2005) by Khoon Choy Lee
Context: Nobody would say the cowshed was heaven and nobody would say the inhuman torture of so many victims be called a revolution of the proletariat. … A museum should be established to remind China of the follies and disasters that had fallen from 1966 to 1976. We cannot forget what had happened and history should not repeat itself.