40
[The twenty-one 'Original Epigrams' following were printed in the Morning Post, in September and October, 1802, over the signature 'ΕΣΤΗΣΕ'. They were included in Essays, &c., iii. 978-86, and were first collected in P. and D. W., 1877, ii. 171-8.]
What is an Epigram? a dwarfish whole,
Its body brevity, and wit its soul.
First published in Morning Post, Sept. 23, 1802. Included in Poetical Register, 1802 (1803), ii. 253; and in The Friend, No. 12, Nov. 9, 1809. Cf. Wernicke's Beschaffenheit der Überschriften (i. e. The Nature of the epigram), Bk. I, No. 1.
'Dann lässt die Überschrift kein Leser aus der Acht,
Wenn in der Kürz' ihr Leib, die Seel' in Witz bestehet.'
