Status Updates From The Life of Herod the Great

Polybius
Be a realist and a rationalist. Seek the heart of matters. No history, for there is “no more ready corrective of conduct the knowledge of the past.“ “it is history, and history, alone, which, without involving us, in actual danger, will mature our judgment, and prepare us… whatever may be the crisis or the posture of affairs.“ History may be a lantern held up to the present and the future.
Pg xv

Pg. xiii
Vainly it fought to maintain isolation to prevent competition —-geography at war with history.