ts, on all works of
art, on all other pretensions, tastes, talents, but your own, produce
a complete ostracism in the world of intellect, and leave yourself and
your own performances alone standing, a mighty monument in an universal
waste and wreck of genius. By cutting away the rude block and removing
the rubbish from around it, the idol may be effectually exposed to view,
placed on its pedestal of pride, without any other assistance. This
method is more inexcusable than the other. For there is no egotism
or vanity so hateful as that which strikes at our satisfaction in
everything else, and derives its nourishment from preying, like the
vampire, on the carcase of others' reputation. I would rather, in a
word, that a man should talk for ever of himself with vapid, senseless
assurance, than preserve a malignant, heartless silence when the merit
of a rival is mentioned. I have seen instances of both, and can judge
pretty well between them.

There is no great harm in putting forward one's own pretensions (of
whatever kind) if this does not bear a sour, malignant aspect towards
others. Every one sets himself off to the best advantage he can, and
tries to steal a march upon public opinion. In this sense, too, 'all the
world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.' Life itself
is a piece of harmless quackery. A great house over your head is of
no use but to announce the great man within. Dress, equipage, title,
livery-servants are only so many quack advertisements and assumptions
of the question of merit. The star that glitters at the breast would
be worth nothing but as a badge of personal distinction; and the crown
itself is but a symbol of the virtues which the possessor inherits from
a long line of illustrious ancestors! How much honour and honesty have
been forfeited to be graced with a title or a ribbon; how much genius
and worth have sunk to the grave without an escutcheon and without an
epitaph!

As men of rank and fortune keep lackeys to reinforce their claims to
self-respect, so men of genius sometimes surround themselves with a
coterie of admirers to increase their reputation with the public. These
_proneurs,_ or satellites, repeat all their good things, laugh loud at
all their jokes, and remember all their oracular decrees. They are their
shadows and echoes. They talk of them in all companies, and bring back
word of all that has been said about them. They hawk the good qualities
of their patrons as