The pen is the tongue of the mind.
[Sp., La pluma es lengua del alma.]

The pen is the tongue of the mind.
[Sp., La pluma es lengua del alma.]

Oh! rather give me commentators plain,
Who with no deep researches vex the brain;
Who from the read more

Oh! rather give me commentators plain,
Who with no deep researches vex the brain;
Who from the dark and doubtful love to run,
And hold their glimmering tapers to the sun.

Write to the mind and heart, and let the ear
Glean after what it can.

Write to the mind and heart, and let the ear
Glean after what it can.

None but an author knows an author's cares,
Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears.

None but an author knows an author's cares,
Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears.

Smelling of the lamp.

Smelling of the lamp.

Habits of close attention, thinking heads,
Become more rare as dissipation spreads,
Till authors hear at length read more

Habits of close attention, thinking heads,
Become more rare as dissipation spreads,
Till authors hear at length one general cry
Tickle and entertain us, or we die!

And force them, though it was in spite
Of Nature and their stars, to write.

And force them, though it was in spite
Of Nature and their stars, to write.

Will you have all in all for prose and verse? Take the miracle
of our age, Sir Philip Sidney.

Will you have all in all for prose and verse? Take the miracle
of our age, Sir Philip Sidney.

The book that he has made renders its author this service in
return, that so long as the book read more

The book that he has made renders its author this service in
return, that so long as the book survives, its author remains
immortal and cannot die.