Pound

“We never know which lives we influence, or when, or why.”
― Stephen King, 11/22/63

“There is no such thing as a good influence. Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His virtures are not real to him. His sins, if there are such thing as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of someone else's music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“I hold that a strongly marked personality can influence descendants for generations.”
― Beatrix Potter

“Sir, I shall not defeat you - I shall transcend you.”
― Benjamin Disraeli