Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1887-07-09 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

THE RESULTS OF MISDIRECTED AND GUILTY AMBITION.  To attain to this envied situation thel candidates for fortune too frequently abandon the paths of virtue ; for, unhappily, the road which leads to the one and that which leads to the other lie sometimes in very opposite directions. But the ambitious man flatters himself that in the splendid situation to which he advances he will have so many means of commanding the respect and admiration of mankind, and will be enabled to act with such superior propriety and grace, that the lustre of his future couduct will entirely cover or efface the foulness of the steps by which he arrived at that elevation. In many Governments the candidates for the highest stations are above the law, and if they can attain the object of their ambition they have no fear of being called to account for the means by which they acquired it. They often endeavour, therefore, not only by fraud and falsehood, the. ordinary and vulgar arts of intrigue and cabal, but sometimes by the perpetration of the most enormous crimes, by murder and assassination, by rebellion and civil war, to supplant and destroy those who oppose or stand in the way of their greatness. They more frequently miscarry than succeed, , and commonly gain nothing but the disgraceful - punishment which is due to their . crimes. But, though they should be so lucky as to, attain that wishedfor greatness, they are it4ways moat miserably diaappointed in the happiness which they expect to enjoy in it. It is not ease or pleasure, but always honour, of one kind or another, though frequently itn honour very ill , understood, that the ambitious man really , pursues. But the honour of his exalted station appears, both in his own eyes and in those of otlite people, polluted and defiled by , the baseness of the means through which he I rose to it. Though by the profusion of every liberal expense, though by excessive indulgence in every profligate pleasure—the wretched but usual resource of ruined charges, ters ; though by the hurry of public blednets, or by the prouder and more dazzling tumult of war, he may endeavour to efface, both from his own memory and from that of other people, the remembrance of ! what he has done, that remembrance never fails to pursue him. He invokes in vain the dark and dismal powers of forgetfulness and oblivion. He remembers himself what he has done, and that remembrance tells him that other people must likewise remember it. Amidst all the gaudy pomp of the most ostentatious greatness, amidst the venal and vile adulation of the great and of the learned, amidst the more innocent though more foolish acclamations of the COIIIIIIOII people, amidst all the pride of conquest awl the triumph of successful war, he is still secretly pursued by the avenging furies of shame and remorse; and while glory seems to surround him on all sides, be himself, in his own imagination, sees black aud foul infamy fast pursuing hi in,and every moment ready to o 7ertake him from behind. Even the great Cieear, though he had the magnanimity to dismiss his guards, could not dismiss his suspicions. The remembrance of Pharsalia still haunted and pursued him. When, at tin request of the Senate, he had the generosity to pardon Marcellus, he told that assembly that he was not unaware of the designs which were carrying on against his life; but that, as he had lived long enough, both for nature and for glory, he was contented to die, and therefore despised all conspiracies. He had, perhaps, lived long enough for nature; but the roast who felt himself the object of such deadly , resentment from those whose favour he wished to gain, and whom he still wished to consider as his friends, had certainly lived too long for real glory, or for all the happiness which he could ever hope to enjoy in the len(' and esteem of his equals. .  DD.