SINFUL
Ambition is like the sea which swallows all the rivers and is none the fuller; or like
the grave whose insatiable maw for ever craves for the bodies of men. It is not like an
amphora, which being full receives no more, but its fulness swells it till a still greater
vacuum is formed. In all probability, Napoleon never longed for a sceptre till he
gained the bâton, nor dreamed of being conqueror of Europe till he had gained the
crown of France. Caligula, with the world at his feet, was mad with a longing for the
moon, and could he have gained it the imperial lunatic would have coveted the sun.
It is in vain to feed a fire which grows the more voracious the more it is supplied with
fuel; he who lives to satisfy his ambition has before him the labour of Sisyphus, who
rolled up hill an ever-rebounding stone, and the task of the daughters of Danaus,
who are condemned for ever to attempt to fill a bottomless vessel with buckets full of
holes. FA10
He who undertakes too much succeeds but little. PT140
You may burst a bag by trying to fill it too full, and ruin yourself by grasping at too
much. PT140
Our endeavours to go up lead us to push others down. 2153.379
A man is never perfectly at peace if he is ambitious, and craving for this or that
which as yet is beyond his reach. 2626.280