Motivational Quotes

Past

If the past cannot teach the present and the father cannot teach the son, then history need not have bothered to go on, and the world has wasted a great deal of time.

- Hoban, Russell

Best Quotes about Past

Every man is his own ancestor, and every man his own heir. He devises his own fortune, and he inherits his own past.

Hedge, Francis Herbert

Nothing is as new as something which as been long forgotten.

Proverb, German

I cannot sing the old songs, Or dream those dreams again,

Barnard, Charlotte

It's linkage I'm talking about, and harmonies and structures, And all the various things that lock our wrists to the past.

Wright, Charles

It is one thing to learn about the past; it is another to wallow in it.

Auchincloss, Kenneth

The distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.

Einstein, Albert

It is not the literal past, the facts of history, that shape us, but images of the past embodied in language.

Friel, Brian

Who so desireth to know what will be hereafter, let him think of what is past, for the world hath ever been in a circular revolution; whatsoever is now, was heretofore; and things past or present, are no other than such as shall be again: Redit orbis in orbem.

Raleigh, Sir Walter

One must always maintain one's connection to the past and yet ceaselessly pull away from it. To remain in touch with the past requires a love of memory. To remain in touch with the past requires a constant imaginative effort.

Bachelard, Gaston

10.

What you've done becomes the judge of what you're going to do especially in other people's minds. When you're traveling, you are what you are. People don't have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.

Moon, William Least Heat

11.

The good of other times let people state; I think it lucky I was born so late.

Ovid

12.

The investor of today does not profit from yesterday's growth.

Buffett, Warren

13.

I never look back, I look forward.

Graf, Steffi

14.

If you are carrying strong feelings about something that happened in your past, they may hinder your ability to live in the present.

Brown, Les

15.

The past, though it cannot be relived, can always be repaired.

La Farge, John

16.

You must never regret what might have been. The past that did not happen is as hidden from us as the future we cannot see.

Stern, Richard Martin

17.

The past should be a springboard, not a hammock.

Ball, Ivern

18.

The destruction of the past is perhaps the greatest of all crimes.

Weil, Simone

19.

Man... cannot learn to forget, but hangs on the past: however far or fast he runs, that chain runs with him.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

20.

That though the radiance which was once so bright be now forever taken from my sight. Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, glory in the flower. We will grieve not, rather find strength in what remains behind.

Wordsworth, William

21.

We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and the future.

Douglass, Frederick

22.

Every journey into the past is complicated by delusions, false memories, false namings of real events.

Rich, Adrienne

23.

To look back to antiquity is one thing, to go back to it is another.

Colton, Charles Caleb

24.

The next day is never so good as the day before.

Syrus, Publilius

25.

Losers live in the past. Winners learn from the past and enjoy working in the present toward the future.

Waitley, Denis

26.

It's very expressive of myself. I just lump everything in a great heap which I have labeled the past, and, having thus emptied this deep reservoir that was once myself, I am ready to continue.

27.

Your past is important, but it is not nearly as important to your present as the way you see your future.

Campolo, Tony

28.

While I take inspiration from the past, like most Americans, I live for the future.

Reagan, Ronald

29.

The past does not equal the future.

Robbins, Anthony

30.

The past grows gradually around one, like a placenta for dying.

Berger, John

31.

The beauty of the past is that it is the past. The beauty of the now is to know it. The beauty of the future is to see where one is going.

32.

Only by acceptance of the past, can you alter it.

Eliot, T. S.

33.

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

34.

They spend their time looking forward to the past.

Osborne, John

35.

Those who do remember it will find new ways to screw it up.

Wolfe, Charles

36.

There is a way to look at the past. Don't hide from it. It will not catch you -- if you don't repeat it.

Bailey, Pearl

37.

Look back, and smile at perils past.

Scott, Sir Walter

38.

Don't brood on the past, but don't forget it either.

Raddal, Thomas H.

39.

In the maxim of the past you cannot go anywhere.

Gorky, Maxim

40.

Living in the past has one thing going for it; it's cheaper!

Saying

41.

We live in a world where amnesia is the most wished-for state. When did history become a bad word?

Guare, John

42.

If the only new thing we have to offer is an improved version of the past, then today can only be inferior to yesterday. Hypnotized by images of the past, we risk losing all capacity for creative change.

Hewison, Robert

43.

As lousy as things are now, tomorrow they will be somebody's good old days.

Barzan, Gerald

44.

There is nothing new, but what has become antiquated.

Proverb, French

45.

The past always looks better than it was because it isn't here.

Dunne, Finley Peter

46.

We are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4am of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget.

Didion, Joan

47.

Yesterday is a canceled check: Forget it. Tomorrow is a promissory note: Don't count on it. Today is ready cash: Use it!

Bliss, Edwin C.

48.

The true picture of the past flits by. The past can be seized only as an image which flashes up at the instant when it can be recognized and is never seen again.

Benjamin, Walter

49.

To design the future effectively, you must first let go of your past.

Givens, Charles J.

50.

What is past is prologue.

Shakespeare, William