Sycophancy

“ Also those whom we call sycophants are of the confraternity, house and lineage of these curious persons, save only this difference there is, that sycophants inquire what evil any man hath either designed or committed; whereas our polypragmons hearken after and discover the very calamities and misadventures of their neighbours, which happen even against their will and purpose: and when they have so done, set them abroad to the view of the whole world.
Furthermore, it is said that the name aliterius came up first by occasion of this over-much meddling, called curiosity. ”

“ Be this explanation worth what it may, the word obtained in Greek a more general sense; any accuser, and then any false accuser, was a ‘sycophant’; and when the word was first adopted into the English language, it was in this meaning: thus an old English poet speaks of “the railing route of sycophants”; and Holland: “The poor man that hath nought to lose, is not afraid of the sycophant”. But it has not kept this meaning; a ‘sycophant’ is now a fawning flatterer; not one who speaks ill of you behind your back ”

“ Some of our readers may have seen, in India, a cloud of crows pecking a sick vulture to death—no bad type of what happens in that country as often as fortune deserts one who has been great and dreaded. In an instant all the sycophants, who had lately been ready to lie for him, to forge for him, to pander for him, to poison for him, hasten to purchase the favor of his victorious enemies by accusing him. ”

“ A sycophant does not tell his patron that his fame will survive, not in the renown of his own actions, but in the sonnets of his sycophant. A sycophant, when his patron cuts him out in a love affair, does not tell his patron exactly what he thinks of him. Above all, a sycophant does not write to his patron precisely as he feels on all occasions; and this rare kind of sincerity is all over the sonnets. Shakespear, we are told, was "a very civil gentleman." ”

“ Syc′ophantry, the arts of the sycophant. [Gr. sykophantēs, usually said to mean one who informed against persons exporting figs from Attica or plundering the sacred fig-trees; but more prob. one who brings figs to light by shaking the tree, hence one who makes rich men yield up their fruit by informations and other vile arts—sykon, a fig, phainein, to show.] ”

“ But if truth incline to the opinion that soul and body have the same end, and that there is no remaining consciousness, then, as there is nothing good in death, there certainly is nothing of evil For if consciousness be lost, the case is the same with Scipio as if he had never been born, though that he was born I have so ample reason to rejoice, and this city will be glad so long as it shall stand Thus in either event, with him, as I have said, all has issued well, though with great discomfort for me, who more fittingly, as I entered into life before him ought to have left it before him. ”

“ Of these, finally, you may see the degrading end, when the time-serving sycophant has departed, and the hanger-on, deserting them, has defiled the exposed side of the man who has retired into a private condition. ”

“ Sycophants and flatterers are undesignedly treacherous and fickle. They are prone to admire inordinately at first, and not finding a constant supply of food for this kind of sickly appetite, take a distaste to the object of their idolatry. To be even with themselves for their credulity, they sharpen their wits to spy out faults, and are delighted to find that this answers better than their first employment. ”

“ It is also strange that intelligent men, will like sycophants, toady to these self-made gods, worship and bow down before them, and consider it one of the greatest favors to be admitted to their presence and receive but a word or a look from them. ”

“ Think of him! Will y’u please to think of him after that shell game? He begging honest work and denied all over, everywhere, till his hat and his clothes and his boots were in holes, and his body was pretty near in holes—think of him, just a kind of hollo’ vessel of hunger lying in that stable while the shell-game cheat goes off with his pockets full of gold.” Scipio spoke with heat.
“Yes, I know. But, if Bellyful afterward could only feel sorry and try—”
“Are you figuring to fix that up?”—he was still hotter—“because I forbid you to monkey with the truth. Because I never was sorry.” ”

“ I sat thinking of this and that and the other.
“That was a superior lie about the lights on the steers’ horns,” I remarked next.{136}
Scipio shoved one hand under his hat and scratched his head. “They say that’s so,” he said. “I’ve heard it. Never seen it. But—tell y’u—he ain’t got brains enough to invent a thing like that. And he’s too conceited to tell another man’s lie.” ”

“ Massinissa and Syphax combat. Syphax falls. Massinissa unclasps Syphax’ casque, and is [377] about to kill him when Syphax speaks.
Sy. Unto thy fortune, not to thee, we yield.
Mass. Lives Sophonisba yet unstain’d, speak just—
Yet ours unforced?
Sy. Let my heart fall more low
Than is my body, if only to thy glory 50
She lives not yet all thine.
Mass. Rise, rise! Cease strife!
Hear a most deep revenge—from us take life!
Cornets sound a march. Scipio and Lælius Enter. Scipio passeth to his throne. Massinissa presents Syphax to Scipio’s feet, cornets sounding a flourish. ”

“ Siegmund looked at him with awe-stricken eyes. The frail, swift man, with his intensely living eyes, laughed suddenly.
“Fools—the fools, these women!” he said. “Either they smash their own crystal, or it revolts, turns opaque, and leaps out of their hands. Look at me, I am whittled down to the quick; but your neck is thick with compressed life; it is a stem so tense with life that it will hold up by itself. ”

“ From the chemist he receives a still more enjoyable because much more perilous reward, for he is allowed to put his mouth to the spout of a syphon and, if he can endure, to take what comes—and that is the reason why syphons are never perfectly full. ”

“ But yonder, we see, yet towers the Sycamore on the crown of the hill—the first great Tree in the parish that used to get green; for stony as seems the hard glebe, constricted by its bare and gnarled roots, they draw sustenance from afar; and not another knoll on which the sun so delights to pour his beams. Weeks before any other Sycamore, and almost as early as the alder or the birch—the $1, for so we schoolboys called it, unfolded itself like a banner. ”

“ If this nerve is in connection with the brain, then the contraction is a conscious act of will, i.e., takes place in accordance with motives, which, in consequence of external impressions, have arisen as ideas in the brain. If the nerve is not in connection with the brain, but with the sympathicus maximus, then the contraction is involuntary and unconscious, an act connected with the maintenance of the organic life, and the nerve stimulus which causes it is occasioned by inward impressions ”

“ Scipio found that she had been betrothed, in happier days, to Allucius, a young Spanish prince, who was himself a captive. Without a moment’s delay, the conqueror sent for her parents and lover, and addressed the latter in the following words:
“The maid to whom thou wert shortly to have been married has been taken prisoner: from the soldiers who brought her to me, I understand that thy affections are fixed upon her, and indeed her beauty confirms the report. She is worthy of thy love; nor would I hesitate, but for the stern laws of duty and honour, to offer her my hand and heart. ”

“ I set the following propositions against those of Schopenhauer —Firstly, in order that Will may arise, an idea of pleasure and pain is necessary. Secondly, that a vigorous excitation may be felt as pleasure or pain, is the affair of the interpreting intellect, which, to be sure, operates thereby for the most part unconsciously to us, and [Pg 125] one and the same excitation may be interpreted as pleasure or pain. Thirdly, it is only in an intellectual being that there is pleasure, displeasure and Will; the immense majority of organisms have nothing of the kind. ”

“ One who approaches Greatness on his belly so that he may not be commanded to turn and be kicked. He is sometimes an editor.
As the lean leech, its victim found, is pleased To fix itself upon a part diseased Till, its black hide distended with bad blood, It drops to die of surfeit in the mud, So the base sycophant with joy descries His neighbor's weak spot and his mouth applies, Gorges and prospers like the leech, although, Unlike that reptile, he will not let go. ”

“ Sycophants are also fond, when they meet, of dilating to their superiors on the errors of their inferiors; to their inferiors, they censure the faults of their superiors. Men of this kind are all wanting in fidelity to their lord, and in benevolence towards the people. ”

“ That leopard of the Indiana woods, the sycamore, repeated itself in vistas.
"Sycamores always look like dazzling marble shafts blackened with patches of moss," said the young man.
"And their leaves," said the girl sitting on the log not far from him, "smell like poetry. I spread them on my face late in summer after a shower and suck up their breath. But I never can put the sensation into words."
"How's that for a sycamore?" he asked, showing a scrap.
She examined it with great satisfaction: "Why do you go about with a photographic car? Why don't you set out to be an artist?" ”

“ To-morrow I shall force you to tell me how you like the ‘Tragedy’ now! For my part, it delights me—and must raise your reputation as a poet and thinker ... must. Chiappino is highly dramatic in that first part, and speaks so finely sometimes that it is a wrench to one’s sympathies to find him overthrown. Do you know that, as far as the temper of the man goes, I am acquainted with a Chiappino ... just such a man, in the temper, the pride and the bitterness ... ”

“ Whose potent sound will force ourself to fear.
Sy. Whither is Syphax heaved? at length shall’s joy
Hopes more desired than heaven? Sweet labouring earth,
Let heaven be unform’d with mighty charms;
Let Sophonisba only fill these arms,
Jove we’ll not envy thee. Blood’s appetite
Is Syphax’ god; my wisdom is my sense,
Without [367] a man I hold no excellence.
Give me long breath, young beds, and sickness’ ease;
For we hold firm, that’s lawful which doth please. 191
Infernal music, softly. ”

“ I have found that there is no trade that does not involve some sort of swindle, and that such graft is justified to some extent by the stupidity that allows itself to be swindled. — You smile at my confessions, but you know in your heart that I am right.
— I am entirely of your opinion, my fair friend, replied Siegmund, who was just thinking how only yesterday he had defended the sycophant.
— Everyone, continued the other, seeks to make use of the miseries of his fellow-man in order to make smooth his own path through life; one man dresses to please his patron ”

“ Yet, with the heightening of sensibility, in the higher development of the nervous system, the possibility arises that in the nobler, i.e., the objective, organs of sense (sight and hear ing) the exquisitely delicate affections proper to them are perceived without in themselves and directly affecting the will, that is, without being either painful or agreeable, and that therefore they appear in consciousness as indifferent, merely perceived, sensations. ”

“ Cleanor recognized in him the young [224] officer, kinsman to Scipio, whose life he had saved in the attack on the Megara.
"The gods be thanked," said the young Roman, "that I see you yourself again!"
"That I am myself I must believe," replied Cleanor, "but of everything else I feel doubtful. Tell me what has happened."
Scipio looked to the physician with a tacit inquiry whether the subject was permitted.
"Speak on; it will worry him more, now that he has begun to think, to be left in ignorance." ”

“ Scipio could not clear up the mystery. His answer to other questions which I put to him gave me no solution to it; and I returned up-stairs with a heart that suffered under the pressure of disappointment.
The only reflection from which I drew comfort was, that I might have been mistaken. Perhaps, after all, it was not Aurore!
Chapter Forty Six. A Scientific Julep.
To drown care and sorrow men drink. The spirit of wine freely quaffed will master either bodily pain or mental suffering—for a time. There is no form of the one or phase of the other so difficult to subdue as the pang of jealousy. ”

“ The first productions of the blood are its own vessels, and then the muscles, in the irritability of which the will makes itself known to self-consciousness; but with this also the heart, which is at once vessel and muscle, and therefore is the true centre and primum mobile of the whole life. But for the individual life and subsistence in the external world the will now requires two assistant systems: one to govern and order its inner and outer activity, and another for the constant renewal of the mass of the blood ”

“ I still must, in Scipio's opinion, have been slow to understand, when on the afternoon following this talk I invited him to tell me what sort of "finish" he wanted, after such a finishing as had been dealt Trampas already. Getting "laughed plumb sick by the bystanders" (I borrowed his own not overstated expression) seemed to me a highly final finishing. While I was running my notions off to him, Scipio rose, and, with the frying-pan he had been washing, walked slowly at me.
"I do believe you'd oughtn't to be let travel alone the way you do." ”

“ The first essayed was that of the unfortunate Scipio, who, being well charged, began, to the admiration of all present, to raise first one arm, and then the other, then to twist the fingers of his left hand in a peculiar way, as if turning a screw, inclining his head the while towards his left shoulder, and then to saw the air, sweeping his right hand to and fro across his breast, with great briskness and energy, the fingers of his left titillating at the air all the while, so as to present the lively spectacle of a man playing the fiddle ”