Lessons From History

Public domain artwork credit: Pixabay 

I found this quote from Professor Barker on social media; we need these encouraging words in our troubled times.

History is the story of what men and women have thought and done in the past. 

It tells how they have lived and struggled and worked. 

It tells how they have suffered from errors, false ideas, and misfortunes. 

But it tells also how they have continued for many thousands of years to make the world always a happier and more comfortable place in which to live. 

There are sad, discouraging chapters in the book of history, but it tells a cheerful story when we read it as a whole, for the successes of the men and women of the past have been far greater than their failures. 

From these peoples of the past, we have gained a background of strength, of ability, and of courage.

                                                     

Eugene Campbell Barker (1874 – 1956)                               

Chair of the History Department

The University of Texas