The fires of history burn hot and long, but memories of fires do not burn long enough. - Jack Cady

I saw old-fashioned cities, quiet streets, small shops, colorful flags and ornaments and decorations—life before machine guns, before communism and capitalism and the ambitions of generals.

The reason to understand history is not to avoid the mistakes of history—because some fool will make those mistakes for you. Some maniac will start a war, and some other maniac will drop an atom bomb, and you'll be the poor bastard who gets to drop the bomb or be hit by it.
No, you understand history so you can understand yourself.

We have the power of memory. We have the memory of order, and we still have voices. When memory dies, civilization dies.