_... Digito ... monstrari et dicier hic est_;[154] the fondness for admiration and applause seems coeval with man, and accompanies us from the cradle to the grave. Every man pants after distinction, and even in this world affects a kind of immortality. When this love of admiration and applause is the only end proposed by ambition, it then becomes a primary passion; all the other passions are compelled to be subservient, and will be wholly employed on the means conducive to that end. But whether this passion for fame, this eagerness after that imaginary life, which exists only in the breath of other people, be laudable or criminal, useful or frivolous, must be determined by the means employed, which will always be directed to whatever happens to be the reigning object of applause. Upon this principle, however the means may differ, the end will be still the same; from the hero down to the boxer in the bear-garden; from the legislator who new-models a state, down to the humbler genius who strikes out the newest cut for a coat-sleeve. For it was the same principle directing to the same end, which impelled Erostratus to set fire to the temple of Diana, and Alexander to set the world in a flame so quickly after. There is no mark which so surely indicates the reigning manners of a people at different periods, as that quality or turn of mind, which happens to be the reigning object of publick applause. For as the reigning object of applause will necessarily constitute the leading fashion, and as the leading fashion always takes rise among the great or leading people; if the object of applause be praiseworthy, the example of the great will have a due influence upon the inferior classes; if frivolous or vicious, the whole body of the people will take the same cast, and be quickly infected by the contagion. There cannot, therefore, be a more certain criterion, by which we may form our judgment of the national virtue or national degeneracy of any people, in any period of their existence, than from those characters, which are the most distinguished in every period of their respective histories. To analyze these remarkable characters, to investigate the end proposed by all their actions, which opens to us all their secret springs; and to develop the means employed for the acquisition of that end, is not only the most entertaining, but, in my opinion, by much the most useful, part of history. For as the reigning object of applause arises from the prevailing manners of a people, it will necessarily be the reigning object of desire, and continue to influence the manners of succeeding generations, until it is opposed, and gradually gives way to some new object. Consequently the prevailing manners of any people may be investigated without much difficulty, in my opinion, if we attend to the increase or decrease of good or bad characters, as recorded in any period of their history; because the greater number will generally