A Short History of the World Quotes

“The magnitude of these shattering changes can perhaps be grasped by imagining that the invasion had been in the reverse direction and that the Aztecs or Incas had arrived suddenly in Europe, imposed their culture and calendar, outlawed Christianity, set up sacrificial altars for thousands of victims in Madrid and Amsterdam, unwittingly spread disease on a scale that virtually matched the Black Death, melted down the golden images of Christ and the saints, threw stones at the stained-glass windows and converted the cathedral aisles into arms or food warehouses, toppled unfamiliar Greek statues and Roman columns, and carried home to the Mexican and Peruvian highlands their loot in precious metals along with slaves, indentured servants and other human trophies.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“Unpredictable events, or the coincidence of vital events happening side by side, play their part in history. In the emerging of the United States of America, the South American nations, South Africa, Canada and Australia the unforeseen mixture of events was especially powerful in the final decades of the 18th century. Many of those events pirouetted around the fortunes of France, whose influence was as decisive when it was losing as when it was winning wars.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“Within the next two centuries, as the world shrinks and its distances are diminished, an attempt could well be made, by consent or by force, to set up a world government. Whether it will last for long is an open question. In human history, almost nothing is preordained.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“While military and economic might was vital to the success of the United States, the power of its pale empire of ideas was probably even more pervasive.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“The new way of life called for a discipline and a succession of duties that contrasted with the freedom of the gatherers and hunters... The domesticating of plants and animals was a two-way process.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“Looking back on Rome's success, it is all too easy to conclude that its victories were preordained. It is almost as if Rome arose with consummate certainty from the seven hills, gaining such a height that seemingly it could not be challenged. But in almost every phase of Rome's history there were crises”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“It is remarkable that India became a democracy in modern times, because the long-lasting Hindu civilisation at first sight was innately hostile to the ideas that all adults should have an equal vote, irrespective of their caste, and that all adults should be able to share in the social mobility which was part of the democratic spirit. But to graft exotic new trees onto old, when there seemed little hope of success, and to watch them grow vigorously, is not a rare experience in human institutions.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World

“The global role of the United States is perhaps the ultimate chapter in that long period of European expansion which had begun in western Europe, and especially on the Atlantic seaboard, during the 15th century. Europe slowly had outgrown its homeland. Its cultural empire eventually formed a long band traversing most of the Northern Hemisphere and dipping far into the Southern. The modern hub of the peoples and ideas of European origin is now New York as much as Paris, or Los Angeles as much as London. In the history of the European peoples the city of Washington is perhaps what Constantinople — the infant city of Emperor Constantine — was to the last phase of the Roman Empire; for it is unlikely that Europeans, a century hence, will continue to stamp the world so decisively with their ideas and inventions.”
― Geoffrey Blainey, A Short History of the World