No man ever yet became great by imitation. Whatever hopes for the
veneration of mankind must have invention in the design or the
execution; either the effect must itself be new, or the means by which
it is produced. Either truths hitherto unknown must be discovered, or
those which are already known enforced by stronger evidence, facilitated
by clearer method, or elucidated by brighter illustrations.
Fame cannot spread wide or endure long that is not rooted in nature, and
matured by art. That which hopes to resist the blast of malignity, and
stand firm against the attacks of time, must contain in itself some
original principle of growth. The reputation which arises from the
detail or transposition of borrowed sentiments, may spread for awhile,
like ivy on the rind of antiquity, but will be torn away by accident or
contempt, and suffered to rot unheeded on the ground.
No. 155. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1751.
_--Steriles transmisimus annos,
Haec aevi mihi prima dies, haec limina vitae_. STAT. i. 362.
--Our barren years are past;
Be this of life the first, of sloth the last. ELPHINSTON.
No weakness of the human mind has more frequently incurred
animadversion, than the negligence with which men overlook their own
faults, however flagrant, and the easiness with which they pardon them,
however frequently repeated.
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