Prominence

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I wished to see the whole—the first contact, the advance of the moon, and the successive swallowing up of the solar spots, the breaking of the last line of crescent by the lunar mountains into Bailey’s beads, the advance of the shadow through the air, the appearance of the corona and prominences at the moment of totality, the radiant streamers of the corona, the internal structure of the flames, a glance through a polariscope, a sweep round the landscape with the naked eye, the reappearance of the solar limb through Bailey’s beads, and, finally, the retreat of the lunar shadow through the air. ”

“ In my mind, which is completely given up to the idea of glory, I frequently go over the plan of my life. I determine that at forty-five I will write no more, but merely enjoy the fame which I shall have obtained, or imagine that I have obtained, and prepare myself for death. ”

“ Blessed he who in silence sang
And the crown of fame not wearing,
By mob despised and forgotten,
Forsaken nameless has the world!
Deceiver greater than dreams of hope,
What is fame? The adorer's whisper? ”

“ So, Fame groweth to its great ones; their images loom longer in departing;
But the shadow of mind is light, and earth is filled with its glory.
And thou, student of the truth, commended to the praise of God,
Wouldst thou find applause with men?—seek it not, nor shun it.
Ancient fame is roofed in cedar, and her walls are marble ”

“ I will return, your majesty; be sure I will return, and lay at your feet such a jewel as never queen wore yet, an imperishable fame,—a fame that shall couple with your memory the benedictions of millions yet unborn, in climes yet unknown to civilized man. There is an uplifting presentiment in my mind, a conviction that your majesty will live to bless the hour you came to this decision.
Don G. A presentiment? A plain matter-of-fact man, like myself, must take leave of your majesty, if his practical common-sense is to be met and superseded by presentiments! ”

“ 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 ”

“ It demonstrates in a most impressive manner the fact that nobility of character and unselfish devotion to ideals and purposes which lead upward and onward in human progress, constitute the true path to immortality of fame. ”

“ My fame at once, and duty to pursue,
And please the public, by respect to you.
Though you, long since beyond Britannia known,
Have spread your country's glory with your own;
To me you never did more lovely shine,
Than when so late the kindled wrath divine
Quench'd our ambition, in great Anna's fate,
And darken'd all the pomp of human state.
Though you are rich in fame, and fame decay,
Though rais'd in life, and greatness fade away,
Your lustre brightens: virtue cuts the gloom
With purer rays, and sparkles near a tomb. ”

“ When placed by the side of the popular novel, the strength of these stories causes them to stand out like a huge primitive giant by the side of a simpering society miss, and while the grace and beauty of the girl may please the eye for a moment, it is to the rugged strength of the primitive man your eyes will turn to glory in his power and simplicity. ”

“ There was a true and fine air of nobility in his lofty form and well-marked features—a character of matured thought and intellectual power in the expansive brow, and in the firm gaze of his large dark eyes, as yet undimmed by age—with evidence of decision and self-respect, and habitual composure in the finely formed mouth and chin. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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! ”

“ So do the glimpses of these noted actors on the passing stage of human existence, and the memories of their short but eventful careers, come back to us, with intensely interesting, because real power, alongside which the strongest flight of Romance is as a phantom. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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! ”

“ There is, besides, a want of some one striking object to arrest the eye, and fix the attention, which wearies from the general glare. Points, however, there are, both of the sublime and beautiful, that merit all the fame which this noble place has acquired. ”

“ 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. ”

“ She had seen picturesque-looking men—dandies, fops—but this was the first time she had ever seen a noble and magnificent-looking man.
"If his soul is like his face," she thought to herself, "he is a hero." ”

“ Each succeeding generation finds that glamour, or brings it; and each generation, as it passes, deems that its successor has either found or brought less of it. But the glamour is there all the while. ”

“ The two men were one day discussing the question of the permanency of fame, how ephemeral for example was that reputation which depended upon the living presence of the artist to make good its claim; how an actor, an orator, a singer, was bound to enjoy his glory while it lasted, since at the instant of his death all tangible evidence of greatness disappeared; he could not be proven great to one who had never seen and heard him. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Such is your lightness in behaviour, and such is the elation of your mind in pride, that, glorying in foolish ceremonies, and delighting in 'we' and 'us,' in your dreams you compare yourself so near to a prince in honour and estimation, that all virtue and honesty is almost banished from you. ”

“ The test of his success is the permanent impression which his speeches leave on the memory. They do not pass away with the excitement of the moment, but remain in the mind, with the lively colors and true proportions of the scenes which they represent. ”

“ It is the rare lot of some exalted characters, by the united power of virtues and of talents, to soar above their fellow-mortals, and leave a luminous track behind, on which successive ages gaze with wonder and delight. ”

“ Whether the recital of his eloquent speeches, the perusal of his vigorous and original poetry, or the narration of his quaint, yet profound 'History of the World,' engage our attention, all will equally impress us with admiration of his talent, with wonder at his achievements, with sympathy in his misfortunes, and with pity at his fall. ”

“ Numerous other instances might be mentioned that would indicate the ancient fame of our ancestors:—a fame, which arose from every virtue and talent that render mortals pre-eminently great,—from the conquests of love and beauty, from the prowess of their arms, and their architecture, poetry, mathematics, generosity, and piety. ”

“ There we see him standing, an unknown youth, teeth clenched and face determined, fronting the world, and anticipating his own future in it, with something of that feeling which, call it what we may, and smile at it as any one may in the retrospect, has probably, by God’s own ordinance, filled every great and honest heart at the outset of a great career:—
Lay the vain impostors low! ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ But the multitude are abundantly able—none more so—to respond with admiring interest to the impression of original power, recognize the broad outlines of a sublime and fiery soul, thrill under the general signs of genius, and pay deserved tribute to popular exhibitions of skill. ”

“ Few careers can be marked out so clearly; few have such a glamour. But the glamour and the glory are yet to come; they lie beyond this book. Already indeed there are confidence and hope, confidence in his vigour, his honesty, and his uprightness ”

“ They may be covered with the sloth of habit, or with the pretence of humility; they may come only in dim, shadowy visions, that feed the eye like the glories of an ocean sunrise; but you may be sure that they will come: even before one is aware, the bold, adventurous goddess, whose name is Ambition, and whose dower is Fame, will be toying with the feeble heart. ”

“ 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. ”

“ There was a fascination, a spirit of infatuating ecstasy, in serving one whose steps had so often led to glory, that filled a man’s entire heart. One learned to feel, that the rays of his own splendid achievements shed a lustre on all around him and each had his portion of undying fame. ”

“ What it none the less infinitely beguiles me to recognise to-day is that such exhibitions, for all their greater direct radiance, and still more for all their general implication of a store of meaning and mystery and beauty that they alone, from example to example, from prodigy to prodigy, had to open out, left me comparatively little crushed by the impression of their concerning me further than my own action perhaps could make good. ”

“ That, after all, is the crown of every education. The crown--as sound habits of mind and conduct are the throne. No imagination at all is brutality; a base imagination is lust and cowardice; but a noble imagination is God walking the earth again. ”

“ 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. ”

“ But the highest peak of all is Character peak, and if you ever want to get there and graduate in the things that last forever, then the way runs along the paths of a kindly, courteous, pure, controlled and reverent life; and one day you will wear the white robes of a life graduate, and the great Chancellor of Life will place the mark of God upon your forehead and crown you forever as a prince of the heights of Character. ”

“ Human celebrity will then be as a sound, the very echoes of which will have departed. The pompous titles with which the vanity of man was pampered; the distinctions which kings could confer, or heraldry emblazon; privileges of caste, nobility of blood, the pride of ancestry, the blaze of reputation, the splendour of talents, shall then be confounded, one and all, as frivolous toys and trifling baubles. ”