I’m afraid of losing my obscurity. Genuineness only thrives in the dark. Like celery.

There lurks in every human heart a desire of distinction which inclines every man first to hope and then to believe that nature has given him something peculiar to himself. 

Men are generally more pleased with a widespread than with a great reputation.

Wood burns because it has the proper stuff in it, and a man becomes famous because he has the proper stuff in him.

If fame is only to come after death, I am in no hurry for it.

How sweet it is to have people point and say, “There he is.”

Avoid the talk of men. For talk is mischievous, light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of. Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even talk is in some ways divine.

Reality is always the foe of famous names.

They are trying to make me into a fixed star. I am an irregular planet.

I would much rather have men ask why I have no statue than why I have one.

I won’t be happy till I’m as famous as God.

What a heavy burden is a name that has become too famous.

Most authors seek fame, but I seek for justice—a holier impulse than ever entered into the ambitious struggles of the votaries of that fickle, flirting goddess.