Great is the dignity of Authorship: I magnify mine office;
Albeit in much feebleness I hold it thus unworthily.
For it is to be one of a noble band, the welfare of the world,
Whose haunt is on the lips of men, whose dwelling in their hearts,
Who are precious in the retrospect of Memory, and walk among the visions of Hope,
Who commune with the good for everlasting, and call the wisest, brother,
Whose voice hath burst the Silence, and whose light is flung upon the Darkness,
Who gladden empires with their wisdom, and bless to the farthest generation,
Doers of illimitable good, gainers of inestimable glory!—
We speak but of the Magnates, we heed none humbler than the highest,