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Considering the part played by the sciences in the story of our Western civilization, it is hardly possible to doubt the importance which the history of science will sooner or later acquire both in its own right and as the bridge which has been so long needed in between the Arts and the Sciences.

— Herbert Butterfield The Origins of Modern Science (1957)

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More quotes by Herbert Butterfield

The raconteur knows too well that, if he investigates the truth of the matter, he is only too likely to lose his good story.”

The Origins Of History (1981)

About the scientific revolution: it “outshines everything since the rise of Christianity and reduces the Renaissance and Reformation to the rank of mere episodes”.

Every age likes its historians to place events in a framework that corresponds with contemporary prejudices and answers to contemporary political desires.

Man on His Past: The Study of the History of Historical Scholarship (1955)

One of the paradoxes of history has been the way in which the name of England has come to be so closely associated with liberty on the one hand and tradition on the other hand.

Liberty in the Modern World (1952)

Since the 17th century England has had a happier fate than most of the countries of continental Europe. In particular she has been spared the most violent cataclysms and the bitterness of civil war.

The Englishman and His History (1944)

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The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.

H. P. Lovecraft The Call of Cthulhu (1926)

All religions, arts and sciences are branches of the same tree. All these aspirations are directed toward ennobling man's life, lifting it from the sphere of mere physical existence and leading the individual towards freedom.

Albert Einstein Moral Decay (1937)

Science and religion are two human enterprises sharing many features.

Freeman Dyson Infinite in All Directions (1988)

To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.

Henri Poincaré Science and Hypothesis (1901)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Herbert Butterfield (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.