Life & Wisdom Quote by George William Curtis

Reputation, in Curtis's formulation, is the quick-hit currency of a social world that loves a good story; fame is the slower, sterner verdict delivered by posterity. The line works because it splits what most people treat as synonyms into rival economies of attention. "Favorable notoriety" carries a faint chemical smell: engineered, contingent, dependent on being talked about. It's approval that can be won by proximity to power, scandal, charm, or timing. Curtis is already warning you that the crowd's "good opinion" is often just gossip with better lighting.

Then comes the pivot: fame as "permanent approval" rooted not in popularity but in "great deeds and noble thoughts". Curtis is smuggling in a moral hierarchy, one that flatters the idea of merit while quietly distrusting mass taste. The most revealing phrase is "the best intelligence of mankind". He doesn't say "everyone", or even "history". He invokes an ideal jury: cultivated minds capable of separating the moment's noise from genuine contribution. That's both aspirational and exclusionary, a nineteenth-century confidence that there exists a discernible standard - and that certain people are qualified to apply it.

Context matters. Curtis lived in an America where print culture, lectures, and political celebrity were exploding; the machinery for manufacturing reputation was getting faster. His distinction reads like an early critique of the attention economy: what trends today is not what endures. The subtext is a plea for ethical ambition. Chase what would survive intelligent scrutiny, not what merely travels.