[A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume]@TWC D-Link bookA Treatise of Human Nature PART I OF PRIDE AND HUMILITY 76/84
But if the mind received from any original instinct a desire of fame and aversion to infamy, fame and infamy would influence us without distinction; and every opinion, according as it were favourabk or unfavourable, would equally excite that desire or aversion.
The judgment of a fool is the judgment of another person, as well as that of a wise man, and is only inferior in its influence on our own judgment. We are not only better pleased with the approbation of a wise man than with that of a fool, but receive an additional satisfaction from the former, when it is obtained after a long and intimate acquaintance.
This is accounted for after the same manner. The praises of others never give us much pleasure, unless they concur with our own opinion, and extol us for those qualities, in which we chiefly excel.
A mere soldier little values the character of eloquence: A gownman of courage: A bishop of humour: Or a merchant of learning. Whatever esteem a man may have for any quality, abstractedly considered; when he is conscious he is not possest of it; the opinions of the whole world will give him little pleasure in that particular, and that because they never will be able to draw his own opinion after them. Nothing is more usual than for men of good families, but narrow circumstances, to leave their friends and country, and rather seek their livelihood by mean and mechanical employments among strangers, than among those, who are acquainted with their birth and education.
We shall be unknown, say they, where we go.
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