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• Of all those arts in which the wise excel, Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well.
  -- Sheffield, Duke of Buckinghamshire (1649-1720) -- Essay on Poetry...
• Read Homer once, and you can read no more; For all books else appear so mean, so poor, Verse will seem prose
  but still persist to read, And Homer will be all the books you need....
• And when with envy Time, transported, Shall think to rob us of our joys, You 'll in your girls again be courted, And I 'll go wooing in my boys.
  -- Thomas Percy (1728-1811) -- Winifreda (1720)...
• We 'll shine in more substantial honours, And to be noble we 'll be good.
  -- Thomas Percy (1728-1811) -- Winifreda (1720)...
• But all thing which that shineth as the gold Ne is no gold, as I have herd it told.
  -- Geoffrey Chaucer (1328-1400) -- The Chanones Yemannes Tale, Line 16430...
• Language is by its very nature a communal thing; that is, it expresses never the exact thing but a compromise -- that which is common to you, me and everybody.
  -- Ernest Hulme, Speculatio...
• Ford and Arthur on Vogon poetry: "I thought that some of the metaphysical imagery was really particularly effective.
  And er ... interesting rhythmic devices too, which seemed to counterpoint the ....
• The spectacles of books. -- John Dryden (1631-1700) -- Essay on Dramatic Poetry
• So, you wanted an essay, you got an essay!