United States or Cameroon ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
If, however, in this thirst for glory, not for notoriety, he conceived the wish to surpass Alexander and Caesar, he never desired the renown of Erostratus, and I will say again what I have said before, that if he committed actions to be condemned, it was because he considered them as steps which helped him to place himself on the summit of immortality on which he wished to place his name.
"Why," said I, "you seem to have studied the science of aerostation profoundly." "Yes, monsieur, yes! From Phaethon, Icarus, Architas, I have searched for, examined, learnt everything. I could render immense services to the world in this art, if God granted me life. But that will not be!" "Why?" "Because my name is Empedocles, or Erostratus."
And while you weep and pray in your dark cell, the emperor, with undutiful hand, overturns the edifice of Austria's greatness that edifice which you, dearest mother, had reared with your own hands. He is like Erostratus; his only fame will be to have destroyed a temple which he had not the cunning to build." "We will wrest the fagots from his sacrilegious hands," cried the empress.
He was difficult to please in point of virtue demanding heroism; in talent, genius; in art, perfection. His political opinions were those of Erostratus, with this difference always in favor of the ancient that Vautrot, after setting fire to the temple, would have robbed it also. In short, he was a fool, but a vicious fool as well.
He called him, either in allusion to his stature, or his pseudonym in the Champion, a "Herculean Satyrist," a "Drawcansir in Wit" "who, to make his Poetical Fame immortal, like another Erostratus, set Fire to his Stage, by writing up to an Act of Parliament to demolish it.
Thus the conquest of Peru was retarded by at least twenty-five years, owing to the culpable jealousy of a man whose name has acquired, by Balboa's assassination, almost as wretched a celebrity as that of Erostratus.
I would have risen, but a vigorous hand held me to my seat. "Your name?" I asked. "My name? What matters it to you?" "I demand your name!" "My name is Erostratus or Empedocles, whichever you choose!" This reply was far from reassuring. The unknown, besides, talked with such strange coolness that I anxiously asked myself whom I had to deal with.
That same night the wonder of the world, the temple of Diana at Ephesus, was burnt down by a madman named Erostratus, who thought the deed would make him for ever famous. It was built up again more splendidly than ever, and the image was saved.
Not content with setting off crackers and innocent rockets, many, to make themselves heard at any cost, have gone to the length of perfidy and even crime. The incendiary Erostratus has made numerous disciples.
Let these foolish two-legged creatures, who proudly proclaim that they are made in the image of God, say what they please of me; they cannot deprive me of my fame and my immortality. He who possesses that has received his reward, and dare utter no complaint. Truly Erostratus and Schinderhannes are celebrated, and Eulenspiegle is better known and beloved by the people than Socrates."
Word Of The Day