“So very difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anything by history.”

—  Plutarch , book Parallel Lives

Parallel Lives, Pericles

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "So very difficult a matter is it to trace and find out the truth of anything by history." by Plutarch?
Plutarch photo
Plutarch 251
ancient Greek historian and philosopher 46–127

Related quotes

William Crookes photo

“We say, with truth, that energy is transformed but not destroyed, and that whenever we can trace the transformation we find it quantitatively exact. So far as our very rough exactness goes, this is true for inorganic matter and for mechanical forces. But it is only inferentially true for organized matter and for vital forces.”

William Crookes (1832–1919) British chemist and physicist

Address to the Society for Psychical Research (1897)
Context: I am impelled to one further reflection, dealing with the conservation of energy. We say, with truth, that energy is transformed but not destroyed, and that whenever we can trace the transformation we find it quantitatively exact. So far as our very rough exactness goes, this is true for inorganic matter and for mechanical forces. But it is only inferentially true for organized matter and for vital forces. We can not express life in terms of heat or of motion. And thus it happens that just when the exact transformation of energy will be most interesting to watch, we can not really tell whether any fresh energy has been introduced into the system or not. Let us consider this a little more closely.

Aesop photo

“Spot the falsehood of history and find out the truth.”

Aesop (-620–-564 BC) ancient Greek storyteller

The Spartan Lies.

Terry Pratchett photo
E.M. Forster photo
Ai Weiwei photo
Thomas Merton photo
Morrissey photo

“I find Christmas very difficult”

Morrissey (1959) English singer

Morrissey's reply to a fan's question "What do you think of Christmas?" at Earl's Court 18th December 2004[citation needed]
In Concert

Bryan Ferry photo
George Eliot photo

“Falsehood is so easy, truth so difficult.”

Adam Bede (1859)
Context: These fellow-mortals, every one, must be accepted as they are: you can neither straighten their noses, nor brighten their wit, nor rectify their dispositions; and it is these people — amongst whom your life is passed — that it is needful you should tolerate, pity, and love: it is these more or less ugly, stupid, inconsistent people whose movements of goodness you should be able to admire — for whom you should cherish all possible hopes, all possible patience. And I would not, even if I had the choice, be the clever novelist who could create a world so much better than this, in which we get up in the morning to do our daily work, that you would be likely to turn a harder, colder eye on the dusty streets and the common green fields — on the real breathing men and women, who can be chilled by your indifference or injured by your prejudice; who can be cheered and helped onward by your fellow-feeling, your forbearance, your outspoken, brave justice.
So I am content to tell my simple story, without trying to make things seem better than they were; dreading nothing, indeed, but falsity, which, in spite of one's best efforts, there is reason to dread. Falsehood is so easy, truth so difficult. The pencil is conscious of a delightful facility in drawing a griffin — the longer the claws, and the larger the wings, the better; but that marvellous facility which we mistook for genius is apt to forsake us when we want to draw a real unexaggerated lion. Examine your words well, and you will find that even when you have no motive to be false, it is a very hard thing to say the exact truth, even about your own immediate feelings — much harder than to say something fine about them which is not the exact truth.

Related topics