This quote was on Friday’s page of my Schott’s Almanac calendar:

“It seems to me to indicate great weakness of mind, when a person permits his peace to be at the mercy of every anonymous scribbler who, actuated by envy or hatred (the invariable cause of such attacks), writes a libel on him. If a person so attacked would but reflect that few, if any, who have ever acquired celebrity, or who have been favoured by fortune, have ever escaped similar assaults, he would be disposed to consider them as the certain proofs of a merit, the general acknowledgement of which has excited the ire of the
envious, thus displayed by the only means within their reach - anonymous abuse.”

- The Countess of Blessington, Paris, 1841

Further evidence that people don’t change… and that trolls have been around since at least 1841.

PS: I haven’t ever had the honor of such an attack by an “anonymous scribbler”, but I’ve seen a few thoroughly enjoyable websites dissolve under the assault of their acid. It makes me sad.