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Updated: October 10, 2025
We have no reason to suppose that the early magicians and medicine-men were peculiarly wicked or bent on mere self-aggrandizement any more than we have to think the same of the average country vicar or country doctor of to-day. They were merely men a trifle wiser or more instructed than their flocks.
It is subtle and difficult to define, but Fénelon gives a definition that will aid us when he says, "Simplicity is an uprightness of soul that has no reference to self." It is another word for unselfishness. In these days of self-exploitation and self-aggrandizement, how refreshing it is to meet a man of true simplicity.
He counts it heretical and dangerous to act upon the supposition that the same human nature which, in his own case and that of his associates, can confront all perils, overcome all obstacles, and outstrip the whirlwind in the pursuit of gain, which makes the strong elements its servants, taming and subjugating the very lightnings of heaven to work out its own purposes of self-aggrandizement, must necessarily, and by an ordination of Providence, become weak as water, when engaged in works of love and goodwill, looking for the coming of a better day for humanity, with faith in the promises of the Gospel, and relying upon Him, who, in calling man to the great task-field of duty, has not mocked him with the mournful necessity of laboring in vain.
He had, through all his years, shown an obvious envy of any member of the Church whose circumstances were better than his own. It was apparent in his manner that he regarded such success in the community as an encroachment upon the Smith prerogatives. As soon as he came to power, he accepted every opportunity of self-aggrandizement as a new Smith prerogative.
These Ottimati as he calls them, by a title borrowed from classical phraseology whether they professed the Medicean or the popular cause, were always bent on self-aggrandizement at the expense of the people or their princes. The sympathies of Pitti were on the side of the plebeians, whose policy during the siege was carried out by the Gonfalonier Carducci.
What an author writes is, after all, the sum total of his life, his habits, his characteristics, his experiences, his purposes. He never can write more than he himself is. He can never pass beyond his limitations; and unless he have a purpose higher than writing merely for fame or self-aggrandizement, he thereby marks his own limitations, and what he seeks will never come.
She had well seen to it that the ceremony, so shortly to take place, was on no account to begin until her august word had been given. To further insure this trifling piece of self-aggrandizement she was defraying the whole of the expenses for the demolishment of the aged landmark of the valley.
He added that "he would never give the King of Spain the right-to say that the Prince of Orange had been actuated by no other motives in his career than the hope of self-aggrandizement, and the desire to deprive his Majesty of the provinces in order to appropriate them to himself."
So that when I read demonstrations of the thesis that the heart of the German people is in the war, I am not greatly affected by them. *German Heart Is In the War.* Still, I do myself believe that the heart of the German people is in the war, and that that heart is governed by two motives the motive of self-defense against Russia and the motive of overbearing self-aggrandizement.
A man of the iron integrity of Cobden found himself necessarily in opposition to a man of popularity and self-aggrandizement, like Palmerston.
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