There is a kind of intellectual provincialism in the dogma that life is just one damned thing after another . . . human affairs do not become intelligible until they are seen as a whole.
Source: Recalled on his death, in Time, 3 Nov 1975.
-- Arnold (Joseph) Toynbee, (Apr 14 1889-1975), English historian; He was professor of modern Greek and Byzantine history; wrote the multi-volume Study of History, 1933-61.