The last time I visited Qaddafi was in May of 2001, 15 years after Reagan attacked his rather modest residence where he took me to show me how it had been left.

If… many influential people have failed to understand, or have just forgotten, what we were up against in the Cold War and how we overcame it, they are not going to be capable of securing, let alone enlarging, the gains that liberty has made.

From their experience or from the recorded experience of others (history), men learn only what their passions and their metaphysical prejudices allow them to learn.

In history people dressed much better than we do today.

Born to a tribal Bedouin family of nomadic desert shepherds in the region of Tripoli, Gaddafi was profoundly anti-colonialist. It is affirmed that his paternal grandfather died fighting against the Italian invaders when Libya was invaded by them in 1911.

Unlike Europe, China can’t be intimidated. Europe backs down if the United States looks at it the wrong way. But China, they’ve been there for 3,000 years and are paying no attention to the barbarians and don’t see any need to.

America has fought five wars since 1945 and has gained its objectives in only one of them, the Gulf War.

One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

Divorce is probably of nearly the same date as marriage. I believe, however, that marriage is some weeks the more ancient.

All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.

The people of Egypt are an intelligent people with a glorious history who left their mark on civilization.

Part of what made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians, poets, and artists, and zoologists, and historians. They also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world. But if it hadn’t been computer science, these people would have been doing amazing things in other fields.

On September 11 2001, America felt its vulnerability even to threats that gather on the other side of the Earth. We resolved then, and we are resolved today, to confront every threat from any source that could bring sudden terror and suffering to America.

Ronald Reagan used to alarm his Soviet counterparts by saying that surely they’d both unite against an invasion from Mars.

I don’t know which will go first – rock ‚n‘ roll or Christianity.

When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said ‚Let us pray.‘ We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.

I don’t feel we did wrong in taking this great country away from them. There were great numbers of people who needed new land, and the Indians were selfishly trying to keep it for themselves.

War had always seemed to me to be a purely human behavior. Accounts of warlike behavior date back to the very first written records of human history; it seemed to be an almost universal characteristic of human groups.

I can not believe that war is the best solution. No one won the last war, and no one will win the next war.

If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience.

When General Allenby conquered Jerusalem during World War I, he was hailed in the American press as Richard the Lion-Hearted, who had at last won the Crusades and driven the pagans out of the Holy Land.

The U.S.S.R. had absolutely nothing to do with the triumph of the Cuban Revolution.

The Chinese government wants me to say that for many centuries Tibet has been part of China. Even if I make that statement, many people would just laugh. And my statement will not change past history. History is history.

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We, of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation.

I went to the museum where they had all the heads and arms from the statues that are in all the other museums.

The Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire.

To make America the greatest is my goal, so I beat the Russian and I beat the Pole. And for the U.S.A. won the medal of gold. The Greeks said, ‚You’re better than the Cassius of old.‘

The progress of evolution from President Washington to President Grant was alone evidence to upset Darwin.

For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself.

The 21st century is going to be the American century. Because we lead not only by the example of our power, but by the power of our example. That is the history of the journey of America.

I became a Republican in 1951, the first year I could vote.

History shows us that in times of people feeling like they are in need of some sort of rebellion or protests, the artists rise because the poetry we create about pain and its relationship to culture in the world begins to soothe and heal people who are feeling confused or afraid.

Grounded in the natural philosophy of the Middle Ages, alchemy formed a bridge: on the one hand into the past, to Gnosticism, and on the other into the future, to the modern psychology of the unconscious.

The Middle East is obviously an issue that has plagued the region for centuries.

Hence poetry is something more philosophic and of graver import than history, since its statements are rather of the nature of universals, whereas those of history are singulars.

I was an Eisenhower Republican when I started out at 21 because he promised to get us out of the Korean War.

Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.

I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves, and I watch my daughters – two beautiful, intelligent black young women – playing with their dogs on the White House lawn. And because of Hillary Clinton, my daughters, and all our sons and daughters, now take for granted that a woman can be president of the United States.

In the wake of the events of 11 September 2001, it now seems clear that the shock of the attacks was exploited in America.

Colonies do not cease to be colonies because they are independent.

I don’t know who invented high heels, but all women owe him a lot.

In the late 1960s, the masses were supposed to be passive, not entering into the public arena and having their voices heard.

Oh, yes; you Virginians shed barrels of perspiration while standing off at a distance and superintending the work your slaves do for you. It is different with us. Here it is every fellow for himself, or he doesn’t get there.

We all remember Abraham Lincoln as the leader who saved our Union. Founder of the Republican Party.

Reputation is the cornerstone of power. Through reputation alone you can intimidate and win; once it slips, however, you are vulnerable, and will be attacked on all sides. Make your reputation unassailable.

The whole history of pop music had rested on the first person singular, with occasional intrusions of the second person singular.

We should not look down on our first ancestors.

Assassination has never changed the history of the world.

Cuba came to be the last country to get rid of Spanish colonialism and the first to shake off the heinous imperialist tutelage.

History shows that, more often than not, loss of sovereignty leads to liberalisation imposed in the interests of the powerful.

I don’t think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews.

If you want the present to be different from the past, study the past.

History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.

Some mischievous people always there. Last several thousand years, always there. In future, also.

The British constitution has always been puzzling and always will be.

The writer may very well serve a movement of history as its mouthpiece, but he cannot of course create it.

There is nothing new in the world except the history you do not know.

History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid.

Contention existed before the earth was formed.

But let me tell you, this gender thing is history. You’re looking at a guy who sat down with Margaret Thatcher across the table and talked about serious issues.

You may not always have a comfortable life and you will not always be able to solve all of the world’s problems at once but don’t ever underestimate the importance you can have because history has shown us that courage can be contagious and hope can take on a life of its own.