Fame

“ But wherefore all this labour, all this strife? For fame, for riches, for a noble wife? Shall one whom nature, learning, birth, conspired To form not to admire but be admired, Sigh, while his Chloe blind to wit and worth Weds the rich dulness of some son of earth? Yet time ennobles, or degrades each line; It brightened Craggs's, and may darken thine: And what is fame? the meanest have their day, The greatest can but blaze and pass away. ”

“ Question me about notoriety, Miss Lawton, and no man alive can give you more authentic information as to the method of its creation, its staying power, and its value. But I know not fame! If I died to-morrow I'd die like a dog—so far as memory or renown is concerned. Learn early to distinguish between the sound, noise, and rumor of notoriety and the credit, honor, and excellence of fame! ”

“ Fame and honor are twins; and twins, too, like Castor and Pollux, of whom the one was mortal and the other was not. Fame is the undying brother of ephemeral honor. I speak, of course, of the highest kind of fame, that is, of fame in the true and genuine sense of the word; for, to be sure, there are many sorts of fame, some of which last but a day. ”

“ To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?
Were it not better done, as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neaera's hair?
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)
To scorn delights and live laborious days ”

“ Fame is beautiful, and reputation is the glory of genius; but when they are sounded out by fiddles in broad daylight, and blasted over creation by wide-mouthed toot-horns, innate modesty shrinks within itself. ”

“ Fame, duty, wealth, that smile would be!
Oh! but to win it, night and day,
Inglorious at thy feet reclined,
I'd sigh my dreams of fame away,
The world for thee forgot, resigned.
But no, 'tis o'er, and—thus we part,
Never to meet again—no, never,
False woman, what a mind and heart
Thy treachery has undone forever.
WOMAN. Away, away—you're all the same,
A smiling, fluttering, jilting throng;
And, wise too late, I burn with shame,
To think I've been your slave so long. ”

“ The folded glory of the gorse, the sweet-briar air,
To the larks that cannot praise us, knowing nothing of what we do
And the divine, wise trees that do not care
Yet, to leave Fame, still with such eyes and that bright hair! ”

“ The young, the adventurous, the admired - how eagerly and how properly do they not crave for glory. Fame has about it a divine something as it were an echo of perfect worship and of perfect praise, which, though it is itself imperfect, may well deceive the young, the adventurous, and the admired. How great to think that things well done and the enlargement of others shall call down upon our names, even when all is lost but the mere names, a continuous and an increasing benediction. ”

“ First, What, in the more popular acceptation, are Fame and Glory? Secondly, To what extent, if any, are they proper motives of conduct or objects of regard? and, Thirdly, What are True Fame and Glory, and who are the men most worthy of honor? Already, in stating these questions, scenes and characters memorable in history rise before us, while from a distance we discern the dazzling heights of human ambition. ”

“ Pride goeth forth on horseback grand and gay,
But cometh back on foot, and begs its way;
Fame is the fragrance of heroic deeds,
Of flowers of chivalry and not of weeds!
These are familiar proverbs; but I fear
They never yet have reached your knightly ear. ”

“ But when to pomp and power are join’d An equal dignity of mind— When titles are the smallest claim— When wealth and rank and noble blood, 15 But aid the power of doing good— Then all their trophies last; and flattery turns to fame. Bless’d spirit thou, whose fame, just born to bloom Shall spread and flourish from the tomb, How hast thou left mankind for heaven! ”

“ The light of fame endures for no one save through his own or another’s writing. How many and how great kings thinkest thou there have been, of whom there is neither speech nor cogitation? Vainly have men stormed the heights of glory, if their fame does not shine in the light of letters. ”

“ Better than fame is still the wish for fame,
The constant training for a glorious strife:
The athlete nurtured for the Olympian Game
Gains strength at least for life.
[Pg 506]
The wish for Fame is faith in holy things
That soothe the life, and shall outlive the tomb—
A reverent listening for some angel wings
That cower above the gloom.
To gladden earth with beauty, or men's lives
To serve with action, or their souls with truth,—
These are the ends for which the hope survives
The ignobler thirsts of youth. ”

“ When to extend his fame through Heaven & Earth,
As thou to thy reproach mayst well remember,
He ask'd thee, hast thou seen my servant Job?
Famous he was in Heaven, on Earth less known;
Where glory is false glory, attributed
To things not glorious, men not worthy of fame. ”

“ For who so fond as youthful Bards of Fame?
But few, alas! the casual Blessing boast,
So hard to gain, so easy to be lost:
How vain that second Life in others Breath,
Th' Estate which Wits inherit after Death! ”

“ With alacrity they discharge the duty, which Fame commits to their care; and eager to paint the sublimest virtues, they quit the fictions of antiquity, to present to the world in colours, tempered by Genius and the Graces, a picture drawn by the hand of truth. ”

“ That slew his son's young bride!—our ancestor—
That were a spell! Fame! fame!—your hand hath rent
The veil from off your world! To speak of fame,
When the soul is parch'd like mine! Away!
I have join'd these men because they war with man,
And all his hollow pomp! Will you go hence? ”

“ Whose eyes behold through floated cloud and flame
The maiden face of fame
Like April's in Valdelsa; fair as flowers,
And patient as the hours;
Sad with slow sense of time, and bright with faith
That levels life and death;
The final fame, that with a foot sublime
Treads down reluctant time;
The fame that waits and watches and is wise,
A virgin with chaste eyes,
A goddess who takes hands with great men's grief ”

“ Of this ambiguous and disputable kind is the love of fame, a desire of filling the minds of others with admiration, and of being celebrated by generations to come with praises which we shall not hear. This ardour has been considered by some as nothing better than splendid madness, as a flame kindled by pride, and fanned by folly; for what, say they, can be more remote from wisdom, than to direct all our actions by the hope of that which is not to exist till we ourselves are in the grave? ”

“ But the round world shall ring of it
And all we are be theirs.
To speak of Fame a venture is,
There's little here can bide,
But we may face the centuries,
And dare the deepening tide:
For though the dust that's part of us
To dust again be gone,
Yet here shall beat the heart of us—
The School we handed on! ”

“ What Is Glory? What Is Fame?
What is Glory? What is Fame?
The echo of a long lost name;
A breath, an idle hour's brief talk;
The shadow of an arrant nought;
A flower that blossoms for a day,
Dying next morrow ”

“ Th' imperishable wreath of fame shall bloom;
Nor is this fate less happy than the rest,
That he should paint thee, who can paint thee best!
SONNET. TO HOPE. How droops the wretch whom adverse fates pursue,
While sad experience, from his aching sight
Sweeps the fair prospects of unproved delight,
Which flattering friends and flattering fancies drew. ”

“ How much more numerous is the list of those, whose abilities not rising beyond the circle of social usefulness have lived "obscure to fame," yet owe the pleasure they imparted to their friends, and the beguilement of many troubles inseparable from mortality, to the fruits of their university studies, and to a partial unrolling before them of that map of knowledge, which before those of loftier claims and some hold upon fame had been more amply displayed! ”

“ Takes fame too easily. Thank Heaven for might,
Which is Heaven's servant, oft! Yet he's not man
Who, when the heart's afire, no brave deed can.
Praise thou the clencht fist that, when blood is hot,
On itself tightens, but descendeth not. ”

“ As on her cheeks and veil the hot tears rain!
But how can I, in speech or song,
Your praises fitly sing,
To whose mature and careful thought,
The work superb, in your proud task achieved,
Will fame immortal bring? ”

“ The warmest blessings which a Muse can give,
And when this transitory state is o'er,
When kingdoms fall, and fleeting Fame's no more,
May Amory triumph in immortal fame,
A nobler title and superior name! ”

“ Then, indeed, the distant blast of Fame’s trumpet is a sound that wakes him early in the morning, and keeps him at his post in the night watches. But then fame means income, position, the world’s esteem, all the good things of life. ”

“ Your name, going out beyond the narrow circle where your work can be appreciated, has become illustrious and added to a nation's glory, and this fame you owe only to yourself; it is the gift of no one, you have followed no master, you belong to no school, you are yourself—and that is enough. ”

“ Thus he went on in vague speculations, seeking, as youth enamoured of fame seeks too fondly, to prove that mind never works, however erratically, in vain, and to retain yet, as an influence upon earth, the soul about to soar far beyond the atmosphere where the elements that make fame abide. ”

“ Is your genius nothing? Is your fame nothing? I speak now as reasonably as yourself; not as a man who holds you peerless, far removed above all the world, but as one discussing a question open to argument. What am I in comparison to the men who would be proud to offer you rank and wealth? ”

“ Noble friend: thou hast opened for us the gate that leadeth to rich treasures; and as we pass through, Ambition lendeth us a hand—ay, she quickeneth our pace; and as, obeying her, we look through the vista of future years, we recognize bright Fame in a field of literary glory, her right hand extended with laurels of honor, to crown those who shall be most fortunate in gaining the platform whereon she standeth ”

“ To excite their activity, and inspire them with a true spirit of persevering industry, it was necessary to fire them with emulation;—to awaken in them a dormant passion, whose influence they had never felt;—the love of honest fame;— and ardent desire to excel;—the love of glory;—or by what other more humble or pompous name this passion, the most noble, and most beneficent that warms the human heart, can be distinguished. ”

“ The nameless brave whose palms are won.
Outcast they sleep; yet fame is nigh—
⁠Pure fame of deeds, not doers;
Nor deeds of men who bleeding die
⁠In cheer of hymns that round them float:
In happy dreams such close the eye. ”

“ However high our names may be inscribed upon the gilded scroll of fame, to thee we all the honor give, to thee all praises bring. And when, in after years, we're wearied by the bustle of a busy world, our hearts will often long to turn and seek repose beneath thy sheltering shade. ”

“ In like manner, one who aims at glory or fame directly will win only that wretched caricature which we call notoriety. Glory and fame, so far as they are desirable things, are remote results which come of themselves at the end of long and repeated and able exertions. ”

“ I am clever, but my cleverness has as yet not been thoroughly tested on anything.... I am honest; that is to say, I love goodness.... There is a thing I love more than goodness, and that is fame. I am so ambitious, and so little has this feeling been gratified, that, should I have to choose between fame and goodness, I fear I may often choose the former. ”

“ Fame beckons, sitting high in the heavens; and joy lends a halo to the vision. A thousand resolves stir your heart; your hand is hot and feverish for action; your brain works madly, and you snatch here and you snatch there, in the convulsive throes of your delirium. ”

“ And when, by blending all these characters, each great in itself, and worthy of the ambition of the highest talents and of the longest life, into a single character, we have made a fame which the grandest intellects of modern times might glory in attaining, we have but one of the elements, developed during a comparatively short period only of his career, that make up the reputation of him whose memory we have met this day to honor. ”

“ The admiration of men who care for poetry, and how many of them are there? There's a bigger demand for smoked glasses to look at eclipses of the sun. Why should Fame come to me? Haven't I given up my days for her? That is enough to keep her away. I am a poet; that is enough reason for her to slight me. Proud and aloof and cold as marble, what does Fame care for us? ”

“ If, in addition to this, his written or spoken words possess the subtle qualities which carry them far and lodge them in men's hearts; and, more than all, if his utterances and actions, while informed with a lofty morality, are yet tinged with the glow of human sympathy,—the fame of such a man will shine like a beacon through the mists of ages—an object of reverence, of imitation, and of love. ”

“ He simply wants to emphasize the folly of hoping for fame which is undeserved, and, as he points out, the way to deserve it is by doing well what is to be done. But as you are not fame hunting, it is not the fame part of it that I wish to dwell upon here, so much as the parallel thought, that it is the inner life, the inner strength which comes from resolute effort and familiarity with the best thought, which tells, and which makes for true happiness. ”

“ All that she was conscious of at that moment was that all worth having in the world was hers—the instinct to create, which men call Love, the joy of obtaining recognition for the thing created, which men call Fame. ”

“ Even as in life do the great dominant passions—love, ambition, desire of power or gold or fame or knowledge—form the proud background to the brief-lived flowerets of our youth, lift our eyes beyond the smile of their bloom, catch the glint of a loftier sunbeam, and yet, and yet, exclude our sight from the lengths and the widths of the space which extends behind and beyond them. ”