“The past is never dead. It's not even past.”
Act 1, sc. 3; this has sometimes been paraphrased or misquoted as "The past isn't over. It isn't even past."
Source: Requiem for a Nun (1951)
“God is dead! God remains dead! And we have killed him.”
Sec. 125
The Gay Science (1882)
Context: God is dead! God remains dead! And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
“To be ignorant of the past is to remain a child.”
Cicero
Misattributed
“Life would be a great deal easier if dead things had the decency to remain dead.”
“The past is the only dead thing that smells sweet.”
Edward Thomas, "Early One Morning" from Poems (1917) http://www.richmondreview.co.uk/library/thomas04.html#five
Misattributed
A Retrospective Glance at the Lifework of a Master of Books
Fragments of a Poetics of Fire (1988)
“Monetarism is dead and the alien doctrines of Friedman and Hayek remain only to be buried.”
Speech in the House of Commons (15 March 1982) http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1982/mar/15/budget-resolutions-and-economic-situation
Post-Prime Ministerial
