“We are always doing something for Posterity, but I would fain see Posterity do something for us.”

— Joseph Addison

No. 587 (20 August 1714).
The Spectator (1711–1714)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "We are always doing something for Posterity, but I would fain see Posterity do something for us." by Joseph Addison?

Joseph Addison 226

politician, writer and playwright 1672–1719

Boyle Roche (1736–1807) Irish politician

In a debate in the Irish House of Commons on the vote of a grant which was recommended by Sir John Parnell, Chancellor of the Exchequer, as one not likely to be felt burdensome for many years to come, it was observed in reply that the House had no right to load posterity with a debt for what could in no degree operate to their advantage. This quotation was Sir Boyle's response.
[Barrington, Jonah, Personal sketches and recollections of his own times, Chapter XVII https://archive.org/details/personalsketche06barrgoog]

“There is room enough for a natural 'painture'. The great vice of the present day is bravura, an attempt to do something beyond the truth. In endeavouring to do something better than well, they do what in reality is good for nothing. Fashion always had, & will have, its day — but truth (in all things) only will last, and can only have just claims on posterity.”

John Constable (1776–1837) English Romantic painter

Letter to John Dunthorne (29 May 1802), from John Constable's Correspondence, part 2, pp. 31-32
1800s - 1810s

“It would certainly be better if a writer like Leacock knew always what was best to do and what would look best in the eyes of posterity, but such unnatural foresight cannot be required of any man.”

Robertson Davies book A Voice from the Attic

A Voice from the Attic (1960)

“We fret ourselves to reform life, in order that posterity may be happy, and posterity will say as usual: "In the past it used to be better, the present is worse than the past."”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Alternate translation: We go to great pains to alter life for the happiness of our descendants and our descendants will say as usual: things used to be so much better, life today is worse than it used to be.
Мы хлопочем, чтобы изменить жизнь, чтобы потомки были счастливы, а потомки скажут по обыкновению: прежде лучше было, теперешняя жизнь хуже прежней.
Note-Book of Anton Chekhov (1921)

“We see by means of something which illumines us, which we do not see.”

Antonio Porchia (1885–1968) Italian Argentinian poet

Vemos por algo que nos ilumina; por algo que no vemos.
Voces (1943)

“Sir, very few people reach posterity. Who amongst us may arrive at that destination I presume not to vaticinate. Posterity is a most limited assembly. Those gentlemen who reach posterity are not much more numerous than the planets.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1846/jan/22/address-in-answer-to-the-speech in the House of Commons (22 January 1846).
1840s

“We are each of an unsocial, taciturn disposition, unwilling to speak, unless we expect to say something that will amaze the whole room, and be handed down to posterity with all the eclat of a proverb.”

Jane Austen book Pride and Prejudice

Source: Pride and Prejudice

“In post offices throughout the United States, Selective Service posters [reading "A Man's Gotta Do What A Man's Gotta Do] remind men that only they must register for the draft. If the Post Office had a poster saying "A Jew's Gotta Do What A Jew's Gotta Do…" or if "A Woman's Gotta Do…"”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

were written across the body of a pregnant woman...
Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part 1: The Myth of Male Power, p. 28.

“What artists call posterity is the posterity of the work of art.”

Marcel Proust book In Search of Lost Time

Ce qu'on appelle la postérité, c'est la postérité de l'œuvre.
Source: In Search of Lost Time, Remembrance of Things Past (1913-1927), Vol II: Within a Budding Grove (1919), Ch. I: "Madame Swann at Home"

“Posterity always degenerates till it becomes our ancestors.”

Horace Walpole (1717–1797) English art historian, man of letters, antiquarian and Whig politician

As quoted in "The Works of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford" in The Monthly Review, or, Literary Journal, Vol. 27 (1798) edited by Ralph Griffiths, p. 187

“We are always doing something for Posterity, but I would fain see Posterity do something for us.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Joseph Addison 226

Related quotes

Related topics