TO BE HOPEFUL in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. . Howard Zinn
About This Quote

While we all sometimes feel down and bad and even hopeless, we must remember that good is not always victorious. Humanity has been through some tough times, and we would do well to remember the bad times and the good. We should not let one victory blind us to our failures and injustice. Let us remember our fallen heroes.

Let us remember Abraham Lincoln who freed the slaves, and Martin Luther King Jr. who gave his life for equality.  If we can learn from their mistakes and their triumphs, then maybe we can hope for a better tomorrow.

Some Similar Quotes
  1. When we love, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too. - Paulo Coelho

  2. The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater. - J.r.r. Tolkien

  3. This is where it all begins. Everything starts here, today. - David Nicholls

  4. If you can love someone with your whole heart, even one person, then there's salvation in life. Even if you can't get together with that person. - Haruki Murakami

  5. Yes, I decided, a man can truly change. The events of the past year have taught me much about myself, and a few universal truths. I learned, for instance, that while wounds can be inflicted easily upon those we love, it's often much more difficult... - Nicholas Sparks

More Quotes By Howard Zinn
  1. TO BE HOPEFUL in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine...

  2. But human beings are not machines, and however powerful the pressure to conform, they sometimes are so moved by what they see as injustice that they dare to declare their independence. In that historical possibility lies hope.

  3. The willingness to undertake such action cannot be based on certainties, but on those possibilities glimpsed in a reading of history different from the customary painful recounting of human cruelties. In such a reading we can find not only war but resistance to war, not...

  4. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.

  5. Before God and high heaven, is there a law for one man which is not a law for every other man?

Related Topics