Like common law, the moral imagination works by precedent and example. We are all equipped with an inherited archive of historical events that serves as the background for everything that occurs. Especially when we are confronted with new events that test the limits of moral comprehension, we call upon what is most familiar in historical memory to regain our sense of moral orientation. We require this archive not only for political judgment, but as the necessary horizon for human experience.

Peter E, Gordon (b. 1966) American intellectual historian

“Why Historical Analogy Matters,” New York Review of Books (7 Jan 2020)
    (Source)