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The bard whom pilfer'd pastorals renown,
Who turns a Persian tale for half a crown,
Just writes to make his barrenness appear,
And strains from hard-bound brains eight lines a year.

— Alexander Pope

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Poetry

More quotes by Alexander Pope

Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night:
God said, "Let Newton be!" and all was light.

Histories are more full of Examples of the Fidelity of dogs than of Friends.

Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear.

Love seldom haunts the breast where learning lies,
And Venus sets ere Mercury can rise.

The mouse that always trusts to one poor hole
Can never be a mouse of any soul.

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Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality.

T. S. Eliot Tradition and the Individual Talent (1919)

Poetry, unlike oratory, should not aim at clarity...but be dense with meaning, 'something to be chewed and digested'.

George Chapman Ovid's Banquet of Sense (1595)

I am no poet, but if you think for yourselves, as I proceed, the facts will form a poem in your minds.

Michael Faraday

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Alexander Pope (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.