past on Space and Time

Every creator, from a child with Play-Doh to Michelangelo, learns that creation involves a kind of self-limiting. You produce something that did not exist before, yes, but only by ruling out other opt...

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.

The past, the present and the future are really one: they are today.

If we examine our thoughts, we shall find them always occupied with the past and the future.

Maybe the most sacred function of memory is just that: to render the distinction between the past, present, and future ultimately meaningless: to enable us at some level of our being to inhabit that s...

It’s okay to look at the past and the future. Just don’t stare.

Memories are the key not to the past, but to the future.

Barbara Brown Taylor recounts her first experience with caving, the exploration of caves that are not prepared or made easily accessible for inexperienced explorers. Her guides gave her a bit of helpf...

“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”

..the three things I cannot change are the past, the truth, and you.

When we remember the past, it is not only the past; it breaks into the present and gains a new lease on life.

“What’s past is prologue.”

There are two golden days in the week, upon which, and about which, I never worry—two carefree days, kept sacredly free from fear and apprehension. One of these days is Yesterday; Yesterday, with its ...

The things we say yes to and the things we say no to determine the terrain of our future. My convoluted journey is posted with invitations, and my RSVPs account for the twists and turns. Sometimes, ha...

Learn from the past, prepare for the future, live in the present.

“Shall we never never get rid of this Past? … It lies upon the Present like a giant’s dead body.”

I was regretting the past and fearing the future. Suddenly God was speaking: "My name is I am." I waited and God continued: "When you live in the past, with its mistakes and regrets, it...

“… truth, whose mother is history, who is the rival of time, depository of deeds, witness of the past, example and lesson to the present, and warning to the future.”

What I like about experience is that it is such an honest thing. You may take any number of wrong turnings; but keep your eyes open and you will not be allowed to go very far before the warning signs ...

Trust the past to God’s mercy, the present to God’s love and the future to God’s providence.

Trust no future, howe’er pleasant!  Let the dead Past bury its dead!  Act,—act in the living present!  Heart within, and God o’erhead!

Gratitude looks to the Past and love to the Present; fear, avarice, lust, and ambition look ahead.

The most exemplary nature is that of the topsoil. It is very Christ-like in its passivity and beneficence, and in the penetrating energy that issues out of its peaceableness. It increases by experienc...

There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future.

Being in Christ, it is safe to forget the past; it is possible to be sure of the future; it is possible to be diligent in the present.

Christ came to earth in the past, but Christ comes to us now in prayer and sacrament and human need, and he will come again at the end of the world.

“When it comes to the past, everyone writes fiction.”

Intellect is therefore a vital force in history, but it can also be a dissolvent and destructive power. Out of every hundred new ideas ninety-nine or more will probably be inferior to the traditional ...

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

We just philosophize, complain of boredom, or drink vodka. It's so clear, you see, that if we're to begin living in the present, we must first of all redeem our past and then be done with it f...