13 Quotes by Leopold Von Ranke

To history has been assigned the office of judging the past, of instructing the present for the benefit of future ages. To such high offices this work does not aspire. It wants only to show what actually [essentially?] happened (wie es eigentlich gewesen).

History is no criminal court.

All ages are equidistant from eternity, and just as immediately accessible to God’s presence.

We see before us a series of events which follow one another and are conditioned by one another. I say ‘conditioned’ I certainly do not mean conditioned through absolute necessity. The important point is that human freedom makes its appearance everywhere, and the greatest attraction of history lies in the fact that it deals with the scenes of that freedom.