Sunday, October 16, 2022

Post #3146

Experience, that excellent master, has taught me many things.
—Pliny, the Elder

Sunday, October 09, 2022

Post #3145

Learn to say no. It will be of more use to you than to be able to read Latin.
—Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Sunday, October 02, 2022

Post #3144

The wise man alone is free, and every fool is a slave.
—Stoic Maxim

Sunday, September 25, 2022

Post #3143

The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.
—Niccolò Machiavelli

Sunday, September 18, 2022

Post #3142

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
—William Shakespeare

Sunday, September 11, 2022

Post #3141

Rust of the mind is the blight of abilities.
—Seneca

Sunday, September 04, 2022

Post #3140

The truth is bitter and disagreeable to fools ; but falsehood is sweet and acceptable.
—Chrysostom

Sunday, August 28, 2022

Post #3139

May I govern my passion with an absolute sway,
And grow wiser and better, as my strength wears away,
Without gout or stone, by a gentle decay.
—Walter Pope, M.D. (from The Old Man's Wish)

Sunday, August 21, 2022

Post #3138

A dollar picked up in the road is more satisfaction to us than the 99 which we had to work for, and the money won at Faro or in the stock market snuggles into our hearts in the same way.
—Mark Twain

Sunday, August 14, 2022

Post #3137

Frugality, when all is spent, comes too late.
—Seneca

Sunday, August 07, 2022

Post #3136

The smaller the calibre of mind, the greater the bore of a perpetually open mouth.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes 

Sunday, July 31, 2022

Post #3135

We live, not as we wish to, but as we can.
—Menander

Sunday, July 24, 2022

Post #3134

The wealth of the soul is the only true wealth.
—Lucian 

Sunday, July 17, 2022

Post #3133

A knowledge of thyself will preserve thee from vanity.
—Miguel de Cervantes

The Penalty of Leadership

In every field of human endeavor, he that is first must perpetually live in the white light of publicity. Whether the leadership be vested in a man or in a manufactured product, emulation and envy are ever at work. In art, in literature, in music, in industry, the reward and the punishment are always the same. The reward is widespread recognition; the punishment, fierce denial and detraction. When a man’s work becomes a standard for the whole world, it also becomes a target for the shafts of the envious few. If his work be mediocre, he will be left severely alone – if he achieve a masterpiece, it will set a million tongues a -wagging. Jealousy does not protrude its forked tongue at the artist who produces a commonplace painting. Whatsoever you write, or paint, or play, or sing, or build, no one will strive to surpass or to slander you unless your work be stamped with the seal of genius. Long, long after a great work or a good work has been done, those who are disappointed or envious, continue to cry out that it cannot be done. Spiteful little voices in the domain of art were raised against our own Whistler as a mountebank, long after the big world had acclaimed him its greatest artistic genius. Multitudes flocked to Bayreuth to worship at the musical shrine of Wagner, while the little group of those whom he had dethroned and displaced argued angrily that he was no musician at all. The little world continued to protest that Fulton could never build a steamboat, while the big world flocked to the river banks to see his boat steam by. The leader is assailed because he is a leader, and the effort to equal him is merely added proof of that leadership. Failing to equal or to excel, the follower seeks to depreciate and to destroy – but only confirms once more the superiority of that which he strives to supplant. There is nothing new in this. It is as old as the world and as old as human passions – envy, fear, greed, ambition, and the desire to surpass. And it all avails nothing. If the leader truly leads, he remains – the leader. Master-poet, master-painter, master-workman, each in his turn is assailed, and each holds his laurels through the ages. That which is good or great makes itself known, no matter how loud the clamor of denial. That which deserves to live — lives.
written by Theodore F. MacManus

A deadly viper once bit a hole snipe's hide; But 'twas the viper, not the snipe, that died.

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El Paso, Texas, United States
Native Texan · Navy Veteran · Various Scars and Tattoos · No Talent yet a Character

One From the Archives

Post #1234

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations. Bartlett's Familiar Quotations is an admirable work, and I studied...

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