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About this quote

What does it mean?
The final stage is when we become empty shells admired by the world while rejecting our true selves.
In plain terms
We become hollow images the world applauds instead of our true selves.
What can you take from it?
Avoid becoming a hollow version of yourself.

Where it applies

  • seeking approval
  • losing oneself
  • public life

Putting it to work

  • stay authentic
  • reject hollow praise

Questions to consider

  • Are you living as your true self?
  • Do you seek hollow praise?

Another view

Public success sometimes requires some compromise.

More from Matthew Arnold

  1. It is a very great thing to be able to think as you like; but, after all, an important question remains: what you think.

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  2. Cruel, but composed and bland, Dumb, inscrutable and grand, So Tiberius might have sat, Had Tiberius been a cat.

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  3. Nations are not truly great solely because the individuals composing them are numerous, free, and active; but they are great when these numbers, this freedom, …

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