Pleasure of meat, drink, clothes, &c., are forbidden those that know not how to use them; just as nurses cry pah! when they see a knife in a child's hand; they will never say any thing to a man.—Selden.
There be that can pack the cards, and yet cannot play well: so there are some that are good in canvasses and factions, that are otherwise weak men.—Lord Bacon.
A poet hurts himself by writing prose; as a race-horse hurts his motions by condescending to draw in a team.—Shenstone.
I cannot imagine why we should be at the expense to furnish wit for succeeding ages, when the former have made no sort of provision for ours.—Swift.
Reserve is no more essentially connected with understanding, than a church organ with devotion, or wine with good nature.—Shenstone.