“I hate the man who builds his name
On ruins of another's fame.
Thus prudes, by characters o'erthrown,
Imagine that they raise their own.
Thus Scribblers, covetous of praise,
Think slander can transplant the bays.”
Fable XLV, "The Poet and the Rose"
Fables (1727)
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John Gay 56
English poet and playwright 1685–1732Related quotes

“A prude is a person who thinks that his own rules of propriety are natural laws.”

“Thus neither the praise nor the blame is our own.”
"From a Letter to the Rev. Mr. Newton", line 21. (1782).

Aphorism 26, as translated in Dialogue on Poetry and Literary Aphorisms (1968), p. 151
Variant translation:
Wit is the appearance, the external flash, of fantasy. Hence its divinity and the similarity to the wit of mysticism.
As translated in The Early Political Writings of the German Romantics (1996) edited by Frederick C. Beiser, p. 131
George A. Kelly, "Man's construction of his alternatives." Assessment of human motives (1958): 33-64.

“Who. you ask, is this fellow? — What matter names?
He is only a scribbler who is content.”
"Auctorial Induction"
The Certain Hour (1916)
Context: Thus he labors, and loudly they jeer at him; — That is, when they remember he still exists. Who. you ask, is this fellow? — What matter names?
He is only a scribbler who is content.

The Guardian (12 May 1975), quoted in Robert Shepherd, Enoch Powell (Pimlico, 1997), p. 464
1970s