One thing that history teaches us is how tough it is for us to control it.
TS Eliot, in his essay Tradition and the Individual Talent, says that 'the historical sense involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the past, but of its presence'. Historical sense is a belief that past is not something that is lost or void. The past cohabits with the present.
A major demerit the lack of historical sense holds is uncritical observance to present-day attitudes, particularly the penchant to understand past events in terms of modern values and concepts. We exaggerate our present problems unrealistically in terms of seriousness and importance to those that have occurred in the past. We erroneously believe that current situations are much worse than they had earlier been.
We often fail to acknowledge that the present modifies the history as the history modifies the present.
As Adam Gopnik puts it, the only wisdom history supplies is historical wisdom.
As Adam Gopnik puts it, the only wisdom history supplies is historical wisdom.
