An Essay on Criticism

Some have at first for wits, then poets pass’d,
Turn’d critics next, and prov’d plain fools at last;
Some neither can for wits nor critics pass,
As heavy mules are neither horse nor ass.
Those half-learn’d witlings, num’rous in our isle
As half-form’d insects on the banks of Nile;
Unfinish’d things, one knows not what to call,
Their generation’s so equivocal
:
To tell ’em, would a hundred tongues require,
Or one vain wit’s, that might a hundred tire.
Alexander Pope (1688-1744)
Part
I
, Part
II
, Part
III

An Essay on Criticism (Representative Poetry Online)

I think it’s probably safe to guess what Alexander Pope would think of blogging. Bear in mind, though, that he was writing this at the ripe old age of 20.

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Dennis G. Jerz

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