(OR: Why I waste time in a meaningless field; why I want to spend my life looking at old dusty letters and books; why I care about people who are dead and gone; why this even matters.)

I study history because I love humanity.

I study history because it encompasses the entire realm of human thought and deed.

History is a coded map of the human heart; it is a record of hopes & dreams of the great and the small. History is the ambitions of humans on their knees — in the mosques, the cathedrals, the temples; on the plantations; in the trenches. History is the hopes of the humans looking ahead...