Françoise de Voltaire (1694-1778): History is just a river of lies.

 Voltaire is perhaps the most famous philosopher of the Enlightenment. He contributed essential ideas to 18th-century European Enlightenment.

 He stated that it is not possible to describe in words everything that happens during the course of history and that all writing of history therefore deviates from the true historical events.

 Anyone who tries to describe the historical events will therefore give a version which, by deviating from the historical truth, will give rise to a "more or less angled lies".

 All written history we can study is really just fairy tales. Fairy tales can either be good - i.e. one can learn something useful about them or bad ones - i.e. reduces the individual's opportunities to improve the quality of life. Fairy tales are imagination and do not have to have anything to do with reality. But they may well be reality-based, without claiming so – check: Socrates' gossip filter on:

 https://axiom1a.blogspot.com/2015/06/sokrates-skvallerfilter-skvaller-fortal.html

 Thus it may happen when a historian has created his own lie about history, that there are individuals who choose to further angle the story to make it fit their own agenda. This in turn can lead to bizarre conspiracy theories.

 As a philosopher of life, you are therefore obliged to apply skepticism. I.e. adhere to the Socratic ideal of "not knowing". Whenever you read about what happened and did not happen it creates a belief (not knowing) in something that someone else is trying to make you believe. The more you learn to believe in, the more you distance yourself from your own truth.

 This is what makes the philosopher of life obligated to learn to know himself and his own truth. There are no shortcuts to wisdom. The path to wisdom is through increased insight into the nature of the true self. By learning to know one's true self you also get to know the truth and the knowledge of the true self once possessed. What Socrates called remembrance.

 The whole idea behind the Socratic midwifery method is to recall this knowledge with the help of spiritual questions, which makes the individual wiser through increased self-insight and consequently better judgment.

 The life philosophers in DUGA welcome you if you want to try the modern Socratic midwifery method to get in touch via: www.duga.se

Also check:

https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2020/12/learning-from-history-famous-quote.html

and:

https://axiom1b.blogspot.com/2015/12/decadence-word-decadence-wikipedia.html