1st Viscount Field Marshal Herbert Plumer

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Field Marshal Herbert Plumer (1857-1932)

“Gentlemen, we may not make history tomorrow, but we shall certainly change the geography.”

Field Marshal Herbert Plumer reportedly made this statement prior to detonating tunnels filled with between 500-600 tons of explosives before the Battle of Messines on June 7th, 1917.

Isaac Newton

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Isaac Newton (1643-1727)

“Nature does nothing in vain, and more causes are in vain when fewer suffice. For nature is simple and does not indulge in the luxury of superfluous causes.”

From Isaac Newton’s Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (Book 3, rule 1), translated/edited by I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman (University of California Press, 1999).

The Buddha

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

The Buddha (words recorded 3rd century BCE)

“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who has said it, not even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own common sense.”

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)

“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.”

Benjamin Franklin

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)

“So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable Creature, since it enables one to find or make a Reason for every thing one has a mind to do.”

From The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, edited by Kenneth Silverman (Penguin Classics, 1986).

Marcus Aurelius

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Marcus Aurelius (121-180 CE)

“Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.”

From Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations (7.8)

Sir Thomas More

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thehistorianshut

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August 17, 2016

Sir Thomas More (c. 1478-1535)

“To my mind, no amount of property is equivalent to a human life.”

From “Humanistic Solutions to Social Problems” from Thomas More’s Utopia, reprinted in The Western World: Age of the Protestant Reformation Primary Readings, edited by Mark Kishlansky Et al. Boston: Pearson, 2010.