Joseph Addison Quotes

Why we should put ourselves out of our way to do anything for posterity, for what has posterity ever done for us?

For my name and memory I leave to men's charitable speeches, and to foreign nations and the next ages.

We owe it to our ancestors to preserve entire those rights which they have delivered to our care. We owe it to our posterity not to suffer their dearest inheritance to be destroyed.

I beseech you to live not only for this age, but for the next also.

I don't think about my legacy, if indeed, I have one.

For children preserve the fame of a man after his death.

I hate to think of the day when nobody remembers me as an actor and I can't get good tables in restaurants.

Age makes all things greater after their death; a name comes to the tongue easier from the grave.

I'm never looking at life in terms of legacy.

To be remembered at all is an achievement of sorts.

I believe that whoever is successful should help ensure that the next generation can be successful, too.

With sincere modesty, if there is such a thing, I have never thought of legacy at all. I am always grateful if people like what I have done. A legacy is something no one can forsee.

What life half gives a man, posterity gives entirely.

When I'm asked about legacy, I say it's too early to talk about legacy.

It's not what you take when you leave this world behind you. It's what you leave behind you when you go.

The only 'afterlife' is what other people remember of you.

I think we all want to be remembered for what we did.

You're presuming too much by using the word legacy - presuming that someone is going to care.

Legacy is a stupid thing! I don't want a legacy.

History will treat me right.

For famous men have the whole earth as their memorial.

I do not suppose I shall be remembered for anything. But I don't think about my work in those terms. It is just as vulgar to work for the sake of posterity as to work for the sake of money.

The world may censure me for what I am about to do, but I am sure that posterity will justify me.

We shall have to fight the politician who remembers only that the unborn have no votes and that since posterity has done nothing for us we need do nothing for posterity.

Everyone who receives the protection of society owes a return for the benefit.