It may be glorious to write
Thoughts that shall glad the two or three
High souls, like those far stars that come in sight
Once in a century.
He that commeth in print because he woulde be knowen, is like the foole that commeth into the Market because he woulde be seen.
He who writes prose builds his temple to Fame in rubble; he who writes verses builds it in granite.
No author ever drew a character, consistent to human nature, but what he was forced to ascribe to it many inconsistencies.
You do not publish your own verses, Laelius; you criticise mine. Pray cease to criticise mine, or else publish your own.
Jack writes severe lampoons on me, 'tis said—
But he writes nothing, who is never read.
He who writes distichs, wishes, I suppose, to please by brevity. But, tell me, of what avail is their brevity, when there is a whole book full of them?
The ink of the scholar is more sacred than the blood of the martyr.
To write upon all is an author's sole chance
For attaining, at last, the least knowledge of any.
Præbet mihi littera linguam:
Et, si non liceat scribere, mutus ero.
This letter gives me a tongue; and were I not allowed to write, I should be dumb.
Scripta ferunt annos; scriptis Agamemnona nosti,
Et quisquis contra vel simul arma tulit.
Writings survive the years; it is by writings that you know Agamemnon, and those who fought for or against him.
’Tis hard to say if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But, of the two less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience than mislead our sense.
Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true,
But are not critics to their judgment too?
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,
As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.
In every work regard the writer's end,
Since none can compass more than they intend.
Why did I write? what sin to me unknown
Dipt me in ink, my parents', or my own?
As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame,
I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came.
It is the rust we value, not the gold;
Authors, like coins, grow dear, as they grow old.
E'en copious Dryden wanted, or forgot,
The last and greatest art—the art to blot.
Whether the darken'd room to muse invite,
Or whiten'd wall provoke the skew'r to write;
In durance, exile, Bedlam, or the Mint,
Like Lee or Budgel I will rhyme and print.
Let him be kept from paper, pen, and ink;
So may he cease to write, and learn to think.
'Tis not how well an author says,
But 'tis how much, that gathers praise.
As though I lived to write, and wrote to live.
Ils ont les textes pour eux, mais j'en suis faché pour les textes.
They have the texts on their side, but I pity the texts.
Devise, wit; write, pen; for I am for whole volumes in folio.
Write till your ink be dry, and with your tears
Moist it again, and frame some feeling line
That may discover such integrity.
Of all those arts in which the wise excel,
Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well.
