Samuel Eliot Morison/the Scholar and Historian 1913-1941

Famous quotes containing the words eliot, scholar and/or historian:

    It is possible to have a strong self-love without any self-satisfaction, rather with a self-discontent which is the more intense because one’s own little core of egoistic sensibility is a supreme care.
    —George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)

    The scholar requires hard and serious labor to give an impetus to his thought. He will learn to grasp the pen firmly so, and wield it gracefully and effectively, as an axe or a sword.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    Critical acumen is exerted in vain to uncover the past; the past cannot be presented; we cannot know what we are not. But one veil hangs over past, present, and future, and it is the province of the historian to find out, not what was, but what is. Where a battle has been fought, you will find nothing but the bones of men and beasts; where a battle is being fought, there are hearts beating.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)