In some starved hackney sonneteer, or me!
But let a lord once own the happy lines,
How the wit brightens! how the style refines!
Pope: Essay on Criticism.
Molière has the same sentiment:—
Tous les discours sont des sottises
Partant d’un homme sans éclat;
Ce seraient paroles exquises,
Si c’était un grand qui parlat.
It may also be found in Ennius, Euripides, and other writers. The last notability who has expressed the idea is Emerson, who says,—