Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"Yet if we look more closely, we shall find / Most have the seeds of judgment in their mind: / Nature affords at least a glimm'ring light; / The lines, tho' touch'd but faintly, are drawn right."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"But as the slightest sketch, if justly trac'd, / Is by ill-colouring but the more disgrac'd, / So by false learning is good sense defac'd."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"Tutors, like Virtuoso's, oft inclin'd / By strange transfusion to improve the mind, / Draw off the sense we have, to pour in new; / Which yet with all their skill, they ne'er could do."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"Of all the Causes which conspire to blind / Man's erring Judgment, and misguide the Mind, / What the weak Head with strongest Byass rules, / Is Pride, the never-failing Vice of Fools."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"For as in Bodies, thus in Souls, we find / What wants in Blood and Spirits, swell'd with Wind: / Pride, where Wit fails, steps in to our Defence, / And fills up all the mighty Void of Sense!"

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"A little Learning is a dang'rous thing; / Drink deep, or taste not the Piërian spring: / There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, / And drinking largely sobers us again."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"While from the bounded level of our mind, / Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind, / But more advanc'd, behold with strange surprize / New distant scenes of endless science rise!"

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"True Wit is Nature to Advantage drest, / What oft was Thought, but ne'er so well Exprest; / Something, whose Truth convinc'd at Sight we find, / That gives us back the Image of our Mind."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"Expression is the dress of thought, and still / Appears more decent, as more suitable."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"But if in noble minds some dregs remain, / Not yet purg'd off, of spleen and sour disdain; / Discharge that rage on more provoking crimes, / Nor fear a dearth in these flagitious times."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)