This evil fortune, which generally attends extraordinary men in the management of great affairs, has been imputed to divers causes, that need not be here set down, when so obvious a one occurs, if what a certain writer observes be true, that when a great genius appears in the world the dunces are all in confederacy against him.

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) English writer and churchman
Essay on the Fates of Clergymen (1728)

Restatement of this earlier thought.


 
Added on 7-Apr-10 | Last updated 7-Apr-10
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