deed am not to be pierced by
the shafts of Fortune. My armour is the _aes triplex_ of a clear
conscience, and a mind nourished by the precepts of philosophy. `For
men,' says Epictetus, `are disturbed not by things themselves, but by
their opinions or thoughts concerning those things.' And again,
`whosoever will be free, let him not desire or dread that which it is in
the power of others either to deny or inflict: otherwise, he is a
slave.' And of all such gifts as are dependent on the caprice of
fortune or of men, I have long ago learned to say, with Horace--who,
however, is too wavering in his philosophy, vacillating between the
precepts of Zeno and the less worthy maxims of Epicurus, and attempting,
as we say, `duabus sellis sedere'--concerning such accidents, I say,
with the pregnant brevity of the poet--

"`Sunt qui non habeant, est qui non curat habere.'

"He is referring to gems, and purple, and other insignia of wealth; but
I may apply his words not less justly to the tributes men pay us with
their lips and their pens, which are also matters of purchase, and often
with base coin. Yes, `_inanis_'--hollow, empty--is the epithet justly
bestowed on Fame."

They made the tour of the room in silence after this; but Bardo's
lip-born maxims were as powerless over the passion which had been moving
him, as if they had been written on parchment and hung round his neck in
a sealed bag; and he presently broke forth again in a new tone of
insistance.

"_Inanis_? yes, if it is a lying fame; but not if it is the just meed of
labour and a great purpose. I claim my right: it is not fair that the
work of my brain and my hands should not be a monument to me--it is not
just that my labour should bear the name of another man. It is but
little to ask," the old man went on, bitterly, "that my name should be
over the door--that men should own themselves debtors to the Bardi
Library in Florence. They will speak coldly of me, perhaps: `a diligent
collector and transcriber,' they will say, `and also of some critical
ingenuity, but one who could hardly be conspicuous in an age so fruitful
in illustrious scholars. Yet he merits our pity, for in the latter
years of his life he was blind, and his only son, to whose education he
had devoted his best years--' Nevertheless, my name will be remembered,
and men will honour me: not with the breath of flattery, purchased by
mean bribes, but because I have laboured, and because my labours