“As time advances more things appear, which enable the world to judge of the characters of remarkable men. In our judgments of them at first we are influenced by the opinions which their contemporaries held respecting them, but gradually another opinion arises, on which at last what is called posthumous fame is built up. Men in this way become in a certain degree like phantoms. Much which belongs to them vanishes, and what remains assumes quite a different aspect. Therefore what we know of them will be received according to the spirit of the existing time. So uncertain is the image which even the greatest men leave behind them in history.”
WV
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