| Unconsciously we all have a standard by
which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this
standard is a very simple one and is this: we admire them, we envy them,
for great qualities which we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists in just
that. Our heroes are the men who do things which we recognize with regret
and sometimes with a secret shame that we cannot do. We find not much in
ourselves to admire, we are always privately wanting to be like somebody
else. If everybody was satisfied with himself there would be no heroes. - "Henry H. Rogers," Mark Twain's Autobiography (1924) |
 AI image created by R. Kent Rasmussen |
| We are all alike on the inside. Also we are exteriorly all alike. Scoffing
democrats that we are, we do dearly love to be noticed by a duke, and when
we are noticed by a monarch we have softening of the brain for the rest
of our lives. We try our best to keep from referring to these precious collisions,
and in time some of us succeed in keeping our dukes and monarchs to ourselves;
it costs us something to do this but in time we accomplish it. In my own
case, I have so carefully and persistently trained myself in this kind of
self-denial that today I can look on calm and unmoved when an American is
casually and greatfully playing the earls he has met; I can look on, silent
and unexcited, and never offer to call his hand, although I have three kings
and a pair of emperors up my sleeve. - Mark Twain in Eruption |
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