"If Writings are thus durable, and may pass from Age to Age throughout the whole Course of Time, how careful should an Author be of committing any thing to Print that may corrupt Posterity, and poison the Minds of Men with Vice and Error?"
— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Author
Work Title
Date
Monday, September 10, 1711
Metaphor
"If Writings are thus durable, and may pass from Age to Age throughout the whole Course of Time, how careful should an Author be of committing any thing to Print that may corrupt Posterity, and poison the Minds of Men with Vice and Error?"
Metaphor in Context
If Writings are thus durable, and may pass from Age to Age throughout the whole Course of Time, how careful should an Author be of committing any thing to Print that may corrupt Posterity, and poison the Minds of Men with Vice and Error? Writers of great Talents, who employ their Parts in propagating Immorality, and seasoning vicious Sentiments with Wit and Humour, are to be looked upon as the Pests of Society, and the Enemies of Mankind: They leave Books behind them (as it is said of those who die in Distempers which breed an Ill-will towards their own Species) to scatter Infection and destroy their Posterity. They act the Counterparts of a Confucius or a Socrates; and seem to have been sent into the World to deprave human Nature, and sink it into the Condition of Brutality.
Categories
Provenance
Searching "mind" in Project Gutenberg e-text.
Citation
See Donald Bond's edition: The Spectator, 5 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965).
Date of Entry
06/17/2013
