I Had Rather See The Portrait Of

A Man Finds In The Productions Of Nature An Inexhaustible Stock Of Material On Which He Can Employ Himself, Without Any Temptations To Envy Or Malevolence, And Has Always A Certain Prospect Of Discovering New Reasons For Adoring The Sovereign Author Of The Universe.

In His Comic Scenes, Shakespeare Seems To Produce, Without Labor, What No Labor Can Improve.

Irresolution And Mutability Are Often The Faults Of Men Whose Views Are Wide, And Whose Imagination Is Vigorous And Excursive.

He That Condemns Himself To Compose On A Stated Day Will Often Bring To His Task Attention Dissipated, A Memory Embarrassed, An Imagination Overwhelmed, A Mind Distracted With Anxieties, A Body Languishing With Disease: He Will Labour On A Barren Topic Till It Is Too Late To Change It; Or, In The Ardour Of Invention, Diffuse His Thoughts Into Wild Exuberance, Which The Pressing Hour Of Publication Cannot Suffer Judgment To Examine Or Reduce.

A Man Of Genius Has Been Seldom Ruined But By Himself.