We all have a contract with the public—in us they see themselves, or what they would like to be.

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

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.

And what will history say of me a thousand years hence?

Famous, adj. Conspicuously miserable.

Worldly fame is but a breath of wind that blows now this way, now that, and changes names as it changes in direction.