We might saw, by the way, that success is pretty awful. Its deceptive resemblance to merit has people fooled. For the hordes, success looks just like supremacy. Success, that dead ringer for talent, has a dupe: history. Only Juvenal and Tacitus grumble about it. In our time, a more or less official philosophy has entered into service as Success’s handmaiden, wears its livery and works its antechamber. Succeed: that’s the whole idea. Prosperity presupposes Capability. …Be born with a silver spoon in your mouth, that’s all that counts. Be lucky and the rest will fall into place. Be fortunate, and you’ll be thought great. …They mistake the constellations of the cosmic void for the stars made by ducks’ feet in the soft mud of the bog.
— Victor Hugo, Les Misérables, trans. Julie Rose