88 Quotes About Heritage

We do not have to be ashamed of what we are. As sentient beings we have wonderful backgrounds. These backgrounds may not be particularly enlightened or peaceful or intelligent. Nevertheless, we have soil good enough to cultivate; we can plant anything in it. Unknown

And then it occurs to me. They are frightened. In me, they see their own daughters, just as ignorant, just as unmindful of all the truths and hopes they have brought to America. They see daughters who grow impatient when their mothers talk in Chinese, who think they are stupid when they explain things in fractured English. They see that joy and luck do not mean the same to their daughters, that to these closed American-born minds "joy luck" is not a word, it does not exist. They see daughters who will bear grandchildren born without any connecting hope passed from generation to generation. Amy Tan

Abraham Lincoln quoted the Scriptures in an 1858 speech to the Illinois Republican Convention. He said, “ A house divided against itself cannot stand.” That, I fear, is where diversity leads. If by that term we refer to love and tolerance for peoples who are different from one another, it has great validity for us. But if by diversity we mean that all of us have been given reason to resent one another. Having no common values, heritage, commitment, or hope, then we are a nation in serious trouble. James C. Dobson

Many races as well as cultural influences of men of all kinds have mixed into any man. To select, for approbation the peculiar elements that come from some supposedly Jewish heredity is to open the door to all kinds of nonsense on racial theory. Richard Feynman

Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations. Books, the oldest and the best, stand naturally and rightfully on the shelves of every cottage. They have no cause of their own to plead, but while they enlighten and sustain the reader his common sense will not refuse them. Their authors are a natural and irresistible aristocracy in every society, and, more than kings or emperors, exert an influence on mankind. . Henry David Thoreau

But let us not forget that human love and compassion are equally deeply rooted in our primate heritage, and in this sphere too our sensibilities are of a higher order of magnitude than those of chimpanzees. Jane Goodall

Bless all the women of this world who nurture our heritage while too many man rush off to kill for ideals that might now be deeply and personally held, but will often be viewed as repugnant by later generations. Stephen Jay Gould

It was truer to my father to let the songs he'd sung die with him, little by little, averse at a time. How could these art-mongers constantly ignore the mortality of beauty, a pleonasm if ever I'd heard one? Dimitri Verhulst

Gen. de Gaulle is only concerned about history, and no jury can dictate the judgment of history." Georges Pompidou Mark Kurlansky

My son will wear the title well, the Duke thought, and realized with a sudden chill that this was another death thought. Frank Herbert

If soldiering did not interest him, the soldiers themselves were another matter. He loved to sit with the men and draw out their first-hand stories of past campaigns. Geraldine Brooks

People say you're born innocent, but it's not true. You inherit all kinds of things that you can do nothing about. You inherit your identity, your history, like a birthmark that you can't wash off.... We are born with our heads turned back, but my mother says we have to face into the future now. You have to earn your own innocence, she says. You have to grow up and become innocent. Hugo Hamilton

Let us save what remains: not by vaults and locks which fence them from the public eye and use in consigning them to the waste of time, but by such a multiplication of copies, as shall place them beyond the reach of accident. Thomas Jefferson

Giving Back reframes portraits of philanthropy. Valaida Fullwood

Our children are an integral component of our stories as we are of theirs and, therefore, each child acts as the knighted messengers to carry their forebears’ stories into the future. To deprive our children of the narrative cells regarding the formation of the ozone layer that rims the atmosphere of our ancestors’ saga and parental determination of selfhood is to deny them of the sacred right to claim the sanctity of their heritage. Accordingly, all wrinkled brow natives are chargeable with the sacrosanct obligation of telling their kith and kin the memorable story of the scenic days they spent as children of nature splashing about in their naked innocence in the brook of infinite time and space. We must scrupulous document our family’s history as well as scrawl out our personal story. . Kilroy J. Oldster

A written constitution is needed to protect values AGAINST prevailing wisdom. Antonin Scalia

If you live long enough, you see the same eyes in different people Unknown

Thus she returned to the theme of ‘before, ’ but in a different way than she had at first. She said that we didn’t know anything, either as children or now, that we were therefore not in a position to understand anything, that everything in the neighborhood, every stone or piece of wood, everything, anything you could name, was already there before us, but we had grown up without realizing it, without ever even thinking about it. Not just us. Her father pretended that there had been nothing before. Her mother did the same, my mother, my father, even Rino… <…> They didn’t know anything, they wouldn’t talk about anything. Not Fascism, not the king. No injustice, no oppression, no exploitation … And they thought that what had happened before was past and, in order to live quietly, they placed a stone on top of it, and so, without knowing it, they continued it, they were immersed in the things of before, and we kept them inside us, too. . Elena Ferrante

When people want to win they will go to desperate extremes. However, anyone that has already won in life has come to the conclusion that there is no game. There is nothing but learning in this life and it is the only thing we take with us to the grave–knowledge. If you only understood that concept then your heart wouldn’t break so bad. Jealousy or revenge wouldn’t be your ambition. Stepping on others to raise yourself up wouldn’t be a goal. Competition would be left on the playing field, and your freedom from what other people think about you would light the pathway out of hell. . Shannon L. Alder

Heritage was everything: it was a golden skeleton key, gleaming with power, able to get the wielder through any number of locked doors; it was the christening of the marriage bed with virgin blood on snow-white sheets; it was the benediction of a pristine pedigree, refined through ages of selective breeding and the occasional mercy culling. It was life, and death, and all that spanned between. It was his birthright. Nenia Campbell

Think of all the love poured into him. Think of the tuitions for Montessori and music lessons. Think of the gasoline expended, the treads worn carting him to football games, basketball tournaments, and Little League. Think of the time spent regulating sleepovers. Think of the surprise birthday parties, the daycare, and the reference checks on babysitters. Think of World Book and Childcraft. Think of checks written for family photos. Think of credit cards charged for vacations. Think of soccer balls, science kits, chemistry sets, racetracks, and model trains. Think of all the embraces, all the private jokes, customs, greetings, names, dreams, all the shared knowledge and capacity of a black family injected into that vessel of flesh and bone. And think of how that vessel was taken, shattered on the concrete, and all its holy contents, all that had gone into him, sent flowing back to the earth. Think of your mother, who had no father. And your grandmother, who was abandoned by her father. And your grandfather, who was left behind by his father. And think of how Prince's daughter was now drafted into those solemn ranks and deprived of her birthright – that vessel which was her father, which brimmed with twenty-five years of love and was the investment of her grandparents and was to be her legacy. TaNehisi Coates

Bloodlines and last names didn't make a man extraordinary – the extraordinary existed in what we did in life, not in who we were. Courtney Alameda

Your ancestors are rooting for you. Eleanor Brownn

Part of me shall dwell in my daughter to call upon in times of need of course. Bruce Lee Bond

Genealogy itself is something of a privilege, coming far more easily to those of us for whom enslavement, conquest, and dispossession of our land has not been our lot. Tim Wise

My tongue was handed down to meby datus and katipuneros. The truth ismy mouth is a battlefield thatyou wouldn’t know how to fight in. Danabelle Gutierrez

If the rowan's roots are shallow, it bears no crown. Unknown

Great writing is always rewriting or revisionism, and is founded on a reading that clears space for the self. Harold Bloom

Greatness recognizes greatness, and is shadowed by it. Harold Bloom

The main vehicle for nineteenth-century socialization was the leading textbook used in elementary school. They were so widely used that sections in them became part of the national language. Theodore Roosevelt, scion of an elite New York family, schooled by private tutors, had been raised on the same textbooks as the children of Ohio farmers, Chicago tradesman, and New England fishermen. If you want to know what constituted being a good American from the mid-nineteenth century to World War I, spend a few hours browsing through the sections in the McGuffey Readers. . Charles Murray

Finally, we entered Chetaube County, my imaginary birthplace, where the names of the little winding roads and minuscule mountain communities never failed to inspire me: Yardscrabble, Big Log, Upper, Middle and Lower Pigsty, Chicken Scratch, Cooterville, Felchville, Dust Rag, Dough Bag, Uranus Ridge, Big Bottom, Hooter Holler, Quickskillet, Buck Wallow, Possum Strut .. We always say a picture speaks a thousand words, but isn’t the opposite equally true? . Sol Luckman

Feature in God’s team of trainees and you will play for the winning team! This is your heritage that you will lay hands on the trophy! Israelmore Ayivor

We travel to see beautiful places and to meet great souls. Lailah Gifty Akita

You gotta look backwards to go forwards. Fennel Hudson

The past informs the present. Fennel Hudson

Preserve the spirit of a ‘lost’ age, when time moved slower. Fennel Hudson

It seems like the best escape games come from Japan for some reason. It makes me proud. Denis Markell

When we reject our origins, we become the product of whatever soil that we find ourselves planted; the colors of our leaves change as we consume borrowed nutrients with borrowed roots and, like a tree, we grow. Mike Norton

My father used to say that stories are part of the most precious heritage of mankind. Tahir Shah

It is myopic to base sweeping change on the narrow experience of a few years. Antonin Scalia

Don't you sense the enormity of your mistake — you invade a country without understanding its music. — Norman Mailer Mark Kurlansky

John Brown, raised by disciplinarians, became one himself. Tony Horwitz

A poem, novel, or play acquires all of humanity's disorders, including the fear of mortality Harold Bloom

Nations as well as men require time to learn, whatever may be their intelligence or zeal. Alexis De Tocqueville

Longing for something fresh, for something no one else has said often leads to bad exegesis. Unknown

Violence is temporary, but learning is permanent. Patrick Hennessey

Anecdotes came with his DNA. Chris Matthews

It always matters who the storyteller is. It’s a lens. James Still

How to teach again what has been taught correctly it incorrectly 1000 thousand times, throughout the millenniums of mankind's prudent folly? That is the hero's ultimate difficult task. How to render back into light-world language the speech-defying pronouncements of the dark? Many failures attest to the difficulties of this life-affirmative threshold. Joseph Campbell

I inherited curiosity from my Dad. Tom Clancy

The author says that one of the difficulties of modern parenting is the uncertainty of what parents are preparing children for. In traditional societies this was clear, as parents prepared children for a society and for roles much like their own. She writes, "There is no folk wisdom. Jennifer Senior

They don't know the distinction between taking care of a child and raising a child. Charles Murray

He had to grow his own NCOs. Tom Clancy

In her fury she'd broken into Valencian, indicating the deepest possible roots in the land. I was impressed with how deeply she was from here, in a way I could never imagine being from anywhere, not even my home town. Elisabeth Eaves

I had rather that the human race, having a certain quality in their lives, should continue for only a few centuries than that, losing freedom, friendship, dignity, and mercy, and learning to be quite content without them, they should continue for millions of millennia. C.s. Lewis

Conclusions that philosophers first establish by way of torturous reasoning have a way, over time, of leaking into shared knowledge. Rebecca Goldstein

What makes a civilization real to its inhabitants, in the end, is not just the splendid edifices at it centre, nor even the smooth functioning of the institutions they house. At its core, a civilization is the texts that are taught in its schools, learned by its students and recollected in times of tribulation. Niall Ferguson

Liberals tend to view traditions, policies, and morals of past generations as arbitrary designs put in place by less enlightened people. Because of this, liberals don't pay much attention to why traditions developed or wonder about possible ramifications of their social engineering. John Hawkins

Pride is instilled. It's what we carry with us every day of our lives. Nancy Arroyo Ruffin

Building a naval power takes generations, not so much to develop the necessary technology as to pass along the accumulated experience that creates good admirals. George Friedman

As it stands there is a very strong argument that as the book trade becomes increasingly corporate it's our literary heritage that is at risk - a vital part of our culture. Sara Sheridan

We can't surrender to the culture. We've minimized the role of fathers, so we've created a generation of barbarians, children who become men without growing up. They stay in boyhood through their 20s and 30s, sometimes their whole lives. They think of themselves first, indulge in pornography, do what they feel like, leave their wives, and culture, and churches to raise their children. Randy Alcorn

However much they may smile at her, the old inhabitants would miss Tillie. Her stories give them something to talk about and to conjecture about, cut off as they are from the restless currents of the world. The many naked little sandbars which lie between Venice and the mainland, in the seemingly stagnant water of the lagoons, are made habitable and wholesome only because, every night, a foot and a half of tide creeps in from the sea and winds its fresh brine up through all that network of shining waterways. So, into all the little settlements of quiet people, tidings of what their boys and girls are doing in the world bring real refreshment; bring to the old, memories, and to the young, dreams. . Willa Cather

Identity was partly heritage, partly upbringing, but mostly the choices you make in life. ~ Bran Patricia Briggs

Good wombs have borne bad sons."-- (Miranda, I:2) William Shakespeare

During the whole time consumed in the slow growth of this family tree, the house of Smallweed, always early to go out and late to marry, has strengthened itself in its practical character, has discarded all amusements, discountenanced all story-books, fairy-tales, fictions, and fables, and banished all levities whatsoever. Hence the gratifying fact that it has had no child born to it and that the complete little men and women whom it has produced have been observed to bear a likeness to old monkeys with something depressing on their minds. Charles Dickens

I am praying that the issues from the last 12 generations go into the ground with me so I have NEW issue is to pass on to my son. Unknown

He knew all the stories. His grandfather had given them to him when he sat between the old man’s knees as a child. It was a comfort, though, to hear them again. To call them to mind. All these stories that made him more than just a vintner and more than just a man who carried a spear whom other men were willing to follow. More than just a man who lay dying. The stories made him one of the People, who would never die. . Stant Litore

There should be an honored place in history for statesmen whose ideas turned out to be right. Walter Isaacson

It was easier to come to maturity when there were more well-defined philosophical options. David Brooks

Chronicling future appeasing Prime Minister Joseph Chamberlain's rise to Parliament from first-generation commercial interests rather than the aristocracy, the author diagnoses even then that he had no center outside himself. Barbara W. Tuchman

I wished that I had some other guardian of minor abilities. Charles Dickens

The media "could not be policed from without and had to be policed from within. Tom Clancy

There is nothing I like better than conversing with aged men. For I regard them as travelers who have gone a journey which I too may have to go, and of whom I ought to inquire whether the way is smooth and easy or rugged and difficult. Is life harder toward the end, or what report do you give it? Plato

A father's aim is to raise children who themselves raise good citizens. Nicholas Dawidoff

The author says the earliest Australian aborigines devoted extraordinary amounts of energy to enterprises no one now can understand. Bill Bryson

Respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality. Something cannot emerge from nothing. Frank Herbert

A concerted effort to preserve our heritage is a vital link to our cultural, educational, aesthetic, inspirational, and economic legacies - all of the things that quite literally make us who we are. Steve Berry

My heritage has been my grounding, and it has brought me peace. Maureen OHara