If the past cannot teach the present and the father cannot teach the … — Russell Hoban

If the past cannot teach the present and the father cannot teach the son, then history need not have bothered to go on, and the world has wasted a great deal of time.

Russell HobanNovelist · American · b. 1925

More from Russell Hoban

Philosophy finds it an easy matter to vanquish past and future evils, but the present are commonly too hard for it. — Francois de La Rochefoucauld
We see past time in a telescope and present time in a microscope. Hence the apparent enormities of the present. — Victor Hugo
It also allows you to look as though you're not particularly from the present, future or past, either. — Doug Coupland
Language is an archaeological vehicle... the language we speak is a whole palimpsest of human effort and history. — Russell Hoban
When you suffer an attack of nerves you're being attacked by the nervous system. What chance has a man got against a system? — Russell Hoban
After all, when you come right down to it, how many people speak the same language even when they speak the same language? — Russell Hoban