Ignorance, Madam, Pure Ignorance.

To Talk In Public, To Think In Solitude, To Read And To Hear, To Inquire And Answer Inquiries, Is The Business Of The Scholar

Few Of Those Who Fill The World With Books, Have Any Pretensions To The Hope Either Of Pleasing Or Instructing. They Have Often No Other Task Than To Lay Two Books Before Them, Out Of Which They Compile A Third, Without Any New Material Of Their Own, And With Very Little Application Of Judgment To Those Which Former Authors Have Supplied.

It Is Indeed Certain, That Whoever Attempts Any Common Topick, Will Find Unexpected Coincidences Of His Thoughts With Those Of Other Writers; Nor Can The Nicest Judgment Always Distinguish Accidental Similitude From Artful Imitation.

That Observation Which Is Called Knowledge Of The World Will Be Found Much More Frequently To Make Men Cunning Than Good.

As The Greatest Liar Tells More Truths Than Falsehoods, So May It Be Said Of The Worst Man, That He Does More Good Than Evil.