The past is an immense area of stony ground that many people would like to drive across as if it were a motorway, while others move patiently from stone to stone, lifting each one because they need to know what lies beneath.

The way of history is not that of a billiard ball, which, once hit, moves in a straight line, but like drifting clouds, or the path of a man sauntering through the streets, diverted here by a shadow, there by a knot of bystanders or by a striking facade, until at last he arrives at a place he never knew of nor meant to go to. Inherent in the course of history is considerable deviation.

What we know of the past is mostly not worth knowing. What is worth knowing is mostly uncertain. Events in the past may be roughly divided into those which probably never happened and those which do not matter.

In talking about the past we lie with every breath we draw.