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Get Your Enemy To Read Your Works In Order To Mend Them, For Your Friend Is So Much Your Second Self That He Will Judge Too Like You.

-Alexander Pope

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Get Your Enemy To

Alexander Pope

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Get Your Enemy To Read Your Works In Order To Mend Them, For Your Friend Is So Much Your Second Self That He Will Judge Too Like You.

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To Happy Convents, Bosomed Deep In Vines, Where Slumber Abbots, Purple As Their Wines.

In Men, We Various Ruling Passions Find; In Women, Two Almost Divide The Kind Those, Only Fixed, They First Or Last Obey, The Love Of Pleasure, And The Love Of Sway.

The Best Way To Prove The Clearness Of Our Mind, Is By Showing Its Faults; As When A Stream Discovers The Dirt At The Bottom, It Convinces Us Of The Transparency And Purity Of The Water.

Find, If You Can, In What You Cannot Change. Manners With Fortunes, Humours Turn With Climes, Tenets With Books, And Principles With Times.

How Vast A Memory Has Love!

The Difference Is As Great Between The Optics Seeing As The Objects Seen. All Manners Take A Tincture From Our Own; Or Come Discolor'd Through Out Passions Shown; Or Fancy's Beam Enlarges, Multiplies, Contracts, Inverts, And Gives Ten Thousand Dyes.

No Woman Ever Hates A Man For Being In Love With Her, But Many A Woman Hate A Man For Being A Friend To Her.

A Wit With Dunces, And A Dunce With Wits.

The Greatest Magnifying Glasses In The World Are A Man's Own Eyes When They Look Upon His Own Person.

Pride, Where Wit Fails, Steps In To Our Defence, And Fills Up All The Mighty Void Of Sense.

It Is Not So Much The Being Exempt From Faults, As Having Overcome Them, That Is An Advantage To Us.

A Brain Of Feathers, And A Heart Of Lead.

A Person Who Is Too Nice An Observer Of The Business Of The Crowd, Like One Who Is Too Curious In Observing The Labor Of Bees, Will Often Be Stung For His Curiosity.

Praise Is Like Ambergrease: A Little Whiff Of It, And By Snatches, Is Very Agreeable; But When A Man Holds A Whole Lump Of It To Your Nose, It Is A Stink, And Strikes You Down.

Like Following Life Through Creatures You Dissect, You Lose It In The Moment You Detect.

Wit Is The Lowest Form Of Humor.

Then From The Mint Walks Forth The Man Of Rhyme, Happy To Catch Me, Just At Dinner-time.

Grave Authors Say, And Witty Poets Sing, That Honest Wedlock Is A Glorious Thing.

Not Half So Swift The Trembling Doves Can Fly, When The Fierce Eagle Cleaves The Liquid Sky; Not Half So Swiftly The Fierce Eagle Moves, When Thro' The Clouds He Drives The Trembling Doves.

By Music Minds An Equal Temper Know, Nor Swell Too High, Nor Sink Too Low. . . . . Warriors She Fires With Animated Sounds. Pours Balm Into The Bleeding Lover's Wounds.

Of Fight Or Fly, This Choice Is Left Ye, To Resist Or Die.

Now Warm In Love, Now With'ring In My Bloom Lost In A Convent's Solitary Gloom!

Heaven Breathes Thro' Ev'ry Member Of The Whole One Common Blessing, As One Common Soul.

To Pardon Those Absurdities In Ourselves Which We Cannot Suffer In Others Is Neither Better Nor Worse Than To Be More Willing To Be Fools Ourselves Than To Have Others So.

Passions Are The Gales Of Life.

I Lose My Patience, And I Own It Too, When Works Are Censur'd, Not As Bad But New; While If Our Elders Break All Reason's Laws, These Fools Demand Not Pardon But Applause.

Women, As They Are Like Riddles In Being Unintelligible, So Generally Resemble Them In This, That They Please Us No Longer Once We Know Them.

Trust Not Yourself, But Your Defects To Know, Make Use Of Every Friend And Every Foe.

And Seem To Walk On Wings, And Tread In Air.

As With Narrow-necked Bottles; The Less They Have In Them, The More Noise They Make In Pouring Out.

Search Then The Ruling Passion; There Alone, The Wild Are Constant, And The Cunning Known; The Fool Consistent, And The False Sincere; Priests, Princes, Women, No Dissemblers Here.

Health Consists With Temperance Alone.

I Find Myself Hoping A Total End Of All The Unhappy Divisions Of Mankind By Party-spirit, Which At Best Is But The Madness Of Many For The Gain Of A Few.

Whether The Darken'd Room To Muse Invite, Or Whiten'd Wall Provoke The Skew'r To Write; In Durance, Exile, Bedlam, Or The Mint, Like Lee Or Budgel I Will Rhyme And Print.

What Is Fame? A Fancied Life In Others' Breath.

Old Men, For The Most Part, Are Like Old Chronicles That Give You Dull But True Accounts Of Times Past, And Are Worth Knowing Only On That Score.

Some Place The Bliss In Action, Some In Ease, Those Call It Pleasure, And Contentment These.

True Self-love And Social Are The Same.

Nature And Nature's Laws Lay Hid In The Night. God Said, Let Newton Be! And All Was Light!

The Sound Must Seem An Echo To The Sense.

Say First, Of God Above Or Man Below; What Can We Reason But From What We Know.

Count All Th' Advantage Prosperous Vice Attains, 'tis But What Virtue Flies From And Disdains: And Grant The Bad What Happiness They Would, One They Must Want--which Is, To Pass For Good.

Never Find Fault With The Absent.

Lo, What Huge Heaps Of Littleness Around!

When Rumours Increase, And When There Is An Abundance Of Noise And Clamour, Believe The Second Report.

Who Dare To Love Their Country, And Be Poor.

Who Sees With Equal Eye, As God Of All, A Hero Perish Or A Sparrow Fall, Atoms Or Systems Into Ruin Hurl'd, And Now A Bubble Burst, And Now A World.

Hear How The Birds, On Ev'ry Blooming Spray, With Joyous Musick Wake The Dawning Day.

For Forms Of Government, Let Fools Contest; Whate'er Is Best Administered, Is Best.

The Most Positive Men Are The Most Credulous, Since They Most Believe Themselves, And Advise Most With Their Falsest Flatterer And Worst Enemy--their Own Self-love.

There Is Nothing Wanting To Make All Rational And Disinterested People In The World Of One Religion, But That They Should Talk Together Every Day.

Be Not The First By Whom The New Are Tried, Nor Yet The Last To Lay The Old Aside.

All Seems Infected That Th' Infected Spy, As All Looks Yellow To The Jaundiced Eye.

Did Some More Sober Critics Come Abroad? If Wrong, I Smil'd; If Right, I Kiss'd The Rod.

At Length Corruption, Like A General Flood (so Long By Watchful Ministers Withstood), Shall Deluge All; And Avarice, Creeping On, Spread Like A Low-born Mist, And Blot The Sun.

Two Women Seldom Grow Intimate But At The Expense Of A Third Person; They Make Friendships As Kings Of Old Made Leagues, Who Sacrificed Some Poor Animal Betwixt Them, And Commenced Strict Allies; So The Ladies, After They Have Pulled Some Character To Pieces, Are From Henceforth Inviolable Friends.

If A Man's Character Is To Be Abused There's Nobody Like A Relative To Do The Business.

For Forms Of Faith Let Graceless Zealots Fight; His Can't Be Wrong Whose Life Is In The Right.

Praise From A Friend, Or Censure From A Foe, Are Lost On Hearers That Our Merits Know.

Our Grandsire, Adam, Ere Of Eve Possesst, Alone, And E'en In Paradise Unblest, With Mournful Looks The Blissful Scenes Survey'd, And Wander'd In The Solitary Shade. The Maker Say, Took Pity, And Bestow'd Woman, The Last, The Best Reserv'd Of God.

Men Would Be Angels, Angels Would Be Gods.

I Am His Highness' Dog At Kew; Pray Tell Me, Sir, Whose Dog Are You?

But Those Who Cannot Write, And Those Who Can, All Rhyme, And Scrawl, And Scribble, To A Man.

Die Of A Rose In Aromatic Pain.

Wine Works The Heart Up, Wakes The Wit, There Is No Cure 'gainst Age But It

Court-virtues Bear, Like Gems, The Highest Rate, Born Where Heav'n Influence Scarce Can Penetrate. In Life's Low Vale, The Soil The Virtues Like, They Please As Beauties, Here As Wonders Strike.

Our Rural Ancestors, With Little Blest, Patient Of Labor When The End Was Rest, Indulged The Day That Housed Their Annual Grain, With Feasts, And Off'rings, And A Thankful Strain.

Wholesome Solitude, The Nurse Of Sense!

Nor Public Flame, Nor Private, Dares To Shine; Nor Human Spark Is Left, Nor Glimpse Divine! Lo! Thy Dread Empire, Chaos! Is Restored; Light Dies Before Thy Uncreating Word: Thy Hand, Great Anarch! Lets The Curtain Fall; And Universal Darkness Buries All.

A God Without Dominion, Providence, And Final Causes, Is Nothing Else But Fate And Nature.

A Brave Man Struggling In The Storms Of Fate, And Greatly Falling With A Falling State.

Fine Sense And Exalted Sense Are Not Half So Useful As Common Sense. There Are Forty Men Of Wit For One Man Of Sense; And He That Will Carry Nothing About Him But Gold, Will Be Every Day At A Loss For Want Of Readier Change.

You Beat Your Pate, And Fancy Wit Will Come: Knock As You Please, There's No Body At Home.

Nor Fame I Slight, Nor For Her Favors Call; She Comes Unlooked For, If She Comes At All .

Is Not Absence Death To Those Who Love?

Saying Good Bye

On Life's Vast Ocean Diversely We Sail, Reason The Card, But Passion Is The Gale; Nor God Alone In The Still Calm We Find, He Mounts The Storm, And Walks Upon The Wind.

Astrologers That Future Fates Foreshow.

Worth Makes The Man, And Want Of It The Fellow; The Rest Is All But Leather And Prunello.

Careless Of Censure, Nor Too Fond Of Fame, Still Pleased To Praise, Yet Not Afraid To Blame, Averse Alike To Flatter Or Offend, Not Free From Faults, Nor Yet Too Vain To Mend.

A Mighty Maze! But Not Without A Plan.

Rogues In Rags Are Kept In Countenance By Rogues In Ruffles.

What Riches Give Us Let Us Then Inquire: Meat, Fire, And Clothes. What More? Meat, Clothes, And Fire. Is This Too Little?

To Balance Fortune By A Just Expense, Join With Economy, Magnificence.

Histories Are More Full Of Examples Of The Fidelity Of Dogs Than Of Friends.

Hope Humbly Then; With Trembling Pinions Soar; Wait The Great Teacher, Death, And God Adore; What Future Bliss He Gives Not Thee To Know, But Gives That Hope To Be Thy Blessing Now.

How Do We Know That We Have A Right To Kill Creatures That We Are So Little Above, As Dogs, For Our Curiosity Or Even For Some Use To Us?

A Fly, A Grape-stone, Or A Hair Can Kill.

I Believe No One Qualification Is So Likely To Make A Good Writer, As The Power Of Rejecting His Own Thoughts.

Learn From The Beasts The Physic Of The Field.

Words Are Like Leaves; And Where They Most Abound, Much Fruit Of Sense Beneath Is Rarely Found.

True Wit Is Nature To Advantage Dressed; What Oft Was Thought, But Ne'er So Well Expressed.

Who Breaks A Butterfly On A Wheel?

The Most Positive Men Are The Most Credulous.

Reason, However Able, Cool At Best, Cares Not For Service, Or But Serves When Prest, Stays Till We Call, And Then Not Often Near.

And All Who Told It Added Something New, And All Who Heard It, Made Enlargements Too.

And Write About It, Goddess, And About It!

The Mouse That Always Trusts To One Poor Hole Can Never Be A Mouse Of Any Soul.

See Plastic Nature Working To This End, The Single Atoms Each To Other Tend, Attract, Attracted To, The Next In Place Form'd And Impell'd Its Neighbor To Embrace.

Charm Strikes The Sight, But Merit Wins The Soul.

There Various News I Heard Of Love And Strife,of Peace And War, Health, Sickness, Death, And Life,of Loss And Gain, Of Famine And Of Store,of Storms At Sea, And Travels On The Shore,of Prodigies, And Portents Seen In Air,of Fires And Plagues, And Stars With Blazing Hair,of Turns Of Fortune, Changes In The State,the Fall Of Favourites, Projects Of The Great,of Aid Mismanagements, Taxations New:all Neither Wholly False, Nor Wholly True.

At Ev'ry Word A Reputation Dies.

Some People Will Never Learn Anything, For This Reason, Because They Understand Everything Too Soon.

Fortune In Men Has Some Small Diff'rence Made, One Flaunts In Rags, One Flutters In Brocade, The Cobbler Apron'd, And The Parson Gown'd, The Friar Hooded, And The Monarch Crown'd.

Bear, Like The Turk, No Brother Near The Throne.

Get Your Enemy To Read Your Works In Order To Mend Them, For Your Friend Is So Much Your Second Self That He Will Judge Too Like You.

Eye Nature's Walks, Shoot Folly As It Flies, And Catch The Manners Living As They Rise; Laugh Where We Must, Be Candid Where We Can, But Vindicate The Ways Of God To Man.

Horses (thou Say'st) And Asses Men May Try, And Ring Suspected Vessels Ere They Buy; But Wives, A Random Choice, Untried They Take; They Dream In Courtship, But In Wedlock Wake; Then, Nor Till Then, The Veil's Removed Away, And All The Woman Glares In Open Day.

Placed On This Isthmus Of A Middle State.

An Obstinate Person Does Not Hold Opinions; They Hold Them.

Envy, To Which Th' Ignoble Mind's A Slave, Is Emulation In The Learn'd Or Brave.

Such Labour'd Nothings, In So Strange A Style, Amaze Th' Unlearn'd And Make The Learned Smile.

Where Beams Of Imagination Play, The Memory's Soft Figures Melt Away.

Plays Round The Head, But Comes Not To The Heart. One Self-approving Hour Whole Years Outweighs Of Stupid Starers And Of Loud Huzzas; And More True Joy Marcellus Exil'd Feels Than Cæsar With A Senate At His Heels. In Parts Superior What Advantage Lies? Tell (for You Can) What Is It To Be Wise? 't Is But To Know How Little Can Be Known; To See All Others' Faults, And Feel Our Own.

There Should Be, Methinks, As Little Merit In Loving A Woman For Her Beauty As In Loving A Man For His Prosperity; Both Being Equally Subject To Change.

Eve Left Adam, To Meet The Devil In Private.

The Blest To-day Is As Completely So, As Who Began A Thousand Years Ago.

No Writing Is Good That Does Not Tend To Better Mankind In Some Way Or Other.

Tis From High Life High Characters Are Drawn; A Saint In Crape Is Twice A Saint In Lawn: A Judge Is Just, A Chanc'llor Juster Still; A Gownman Learn'd; A Bishop What You Will; Wise If A Minister; But If A King, More Wise, More Learn'd, More Just, More Ev'rything.

Not Always Actions Show The Man; We Find Who Does A Kindness Is Not Therefore Kind.

The Vulgar Boil, The Learned Roast, An Egg.

Ah! What Avails It Me The Flocks To Keep, Who Lost My Heart While I Preserv'd My Sheep.

Every Man Has Just As Much Vanity As He Wants Understanding.

In Various Talk Th' Instructive Hours They Past, Who Gave The Ball, Or Paid The Visit Last; One Speaks The Glory Of The British Queen, And One Describes A Charming Indian Screen; A Third Interprets Motions, Looks, And Eyes; At Every Word A Reputation Dies.

Fool, 'tis In Vain From Wit To Wit To Roam: Know, Sense, Like Charity, Begins At Home.

A King May Be A Tool, A Thing Of Straw; But If He Serves To Frighten Our Enemies, And Secure Our Property, It Is Well Enough; A Scarecrow Is A Thing Of Straw, But It Protects The Corn.

Is It, In Heav'n, A Crime To Love Too Well? To Bear Too Tender Or Too Firm A Heart, To Act A Lover's Or A Roman's Part? Is There No Bright Reversion In The Sky For Those Who Greatly Think, Or Bravely Die?

Let Joy Or Ease, Let Affluence Or Content, And The Gay Conscience Of A Life Well Spent, Calm Ev'ry Thought, Inspirit Ev'ry Grace, Glow In Thy Heart, And Smile Upon Thy Face.

Never Elated When Someone's Oppressed, Never Dejected When Another One's Blessed.

That Each From Other Differs, First Confess; Next That He Varies From Himself No Less.

Who Dies In Youth And Vigour, Dies The Best.

There Is Nothing That Is Meritorious But Virtue And Friendship.

Unblemish'd Let Me Live Or Die Unknown; Oh, Grant An Honest Fame, Or Grant Me None!

The Doubtful Beam Long Nods From Side To Side.

Virtue, I Grant You, Is An Empty Boast; But Shall The Dignity Of Vice Be Lost?

A Perfect Woman's But A Softer Man.

Truths Would You Teach, Or Save A Sinking Land? All Fear, None Aid You, And Few Understand.

What Nothing Earthly Gives, Or Can Destroy, The Soul's Calm Sunshine, And The Heart-felt Joy, Is Virtue's Prize.

A Fellow Feeling Makes Us Wondrous Kind.

O Peace! How Many Wars Were Waged In Thy Name.

All Nature Mourns, The Skies Relent In Showers; Hushed Are The Birds, And Closed The Drooping Flowers.

Choose A Firm Cloud Before It Fall, And In It Catch, Ere She Change, The Cynthia Of This Minute.

Do Good By Stealth, And Blush To Find It Fame.

O Love! For Sylvia Let Me Gain The Prize, And Make My Tongue Victorious As Her Eyes.

Like Cato, Give His Little Senate Laws, And Sit Attentive To His Own Applause.

Fools Admire, But Men Of Sense Approve.

If Faith Itself Has Different Dresses Worn, What Wonder Modes In Wit Should Take Their Turn?

And Binding Nature Fast In Fate, Left Free The Human Will.

And Not A Vanity Is Given In Vain.

O Let Us Still The Secret Joy Partake, To Follow Virtue Even For Virtue's Sake.

She Went From Opera, Park, Assembly, Play, To Morning Walks, And Prayers Three Hours A Day. To Part Her Time 'twixt Reading And Bohea, To Muse, And Spill Her Solitary Tea, Or O'er Cold Coffee Trifle With The Spoon, Count The Slow Clock, And Dine Exact At Noon.

Sickness Is A Sort Of Early Old Age; It Teaches Us A Diffidence In Our Earthly State.

Offend Her, And She Knows Not To Forgive; Oblige Her, And She'll Hate You While You Live.

From Vulgar Bounds With Brave Disorder Part, And Snatch A Grace Beyond The Reach Of Art.

Luxurious Lobster-nights, Farewell, For Sober, Studious Days!

The Same Ambition Can Destroy Or Save, And Make A Patriot As It Makes A Knave.

Nature Made Every Fop To Plague His Brother, Just As One Beauty Mortifies Another.

Our Judgments, Like Our Watches, None Go Just Alike, Yet Each Believes His Own

Religion Blushing, Veils Her Sacred Fires, And Unawares Morality Expires.

Devotion's Self Shall Steal A Thought From Heaven.

The Character Of Covetousness, Is What A Man Generally Acquires More Through Some Niggardliness Or Ill Grace In Little And Inconsiderable Things, Than In Expenses Of Any Consequence.

A Brave Man Thinks No One His Superior Who Does Him An Injury, For He Has It Then In His Power To Make Himself Superior To The Other By Forgiving It.

To Rest, The Cushion And Soft Dean Invite, Who Never Mentions Hell To Ears Polite.

To Him No High, No Low, No Great, No Small; He Fills, He Bounds, Connects And Equals All!

A Little Learning Is A Dangerous Thing; Drink Of It Deeply, Or Taste It Not, For Shallow Thoughts Intoxicate The Brain, And Drinking Deeply Sobers Us Again.

Our Proper Bliss Depends On What We Blame.

No Silver Saints, By Dying Misers Giv'n, Here Brib'd The Rage Of Ill-requited Heav'n; But Such Plain Roofs As Piety Could Raise, And Only Vocal With The Maker's Praise.

Absent Or Dead, Still Let A Friend Be Dear.

New, Distant Scenes Of Endless Science Rise: So Pleas'd At First, The Towring Alps We Try.

Why Did I Write? What Sin To Me Unknown Dipped Me In Ink, My Parents , Or My Own?

Therefore They Who Say Our Thoughts Are Not Our Own Because They Resemble The Ancients, May As Well Say Our Faces Are Not Our Own, Because They Are Like Our Fathers: And Indeed It Is Very Unreasonable, That People Should Expect Us To Be Scholars, And Yet Be Angry To Find Us So.

Most Authors Steal Their Works, Or Buy.

The Laughers Are A Majority.

The World Forgetting, By The World Forgot. Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind! Each Pray'r Accepted, And Each Wish Resign'd

But See, The Shepherds Shun The Noonday Heat, The Lowing Herds To Murmuring Brooks Retreat, To Closer Shades The Panting Flocks Remove; Ye Gods! And Is There No Relief For Love?

Only Music Has The Ability To Take You To The Edge Of Reality And Allow You To Peek In For A Moment.

The Bookful Blockhead, Ignorantly Read With Loads Of Learned Lumber In His Head.

The Nicest Constitutions Of Government Are Often Like The Finest Pieces Of Clock-work, Which, Depending On So Many Motions, Are Therefore More Subject To Be Out Of Order.

Some People Are Commended For A Giddy Kind Of Good-humor, Which Is As Much A Virtue As Drunkenness.

Man Never Thinks Himself Happy, But When He Enjoys Those Things Which Others Want Or Desire.

E'en Sunday Shines No Sabbath Day To Me.

And You, My Critics! In The Chequer'd Shade, Admire New Light Thro' Holes Yourselves Have Made.

Truth Needs Not Flowers Of Speech.

See The Wild Waste Of All-devouring Years! How Rome Her Own Sad Sepulchre Appears, With Nodding Arches, Broken Temples Spread! The Very Tombs Now Vanish'd Like Their Dead!

For Wit And Judgment Often Are At Strife, Though Meant Each Other's Aid, Like Man And Wife.

Ask For What End The Heavenly Bodies Shine, Earth For Whose Use? Pride Answers, 'tis For Mine For Me Kind Nature Wakes Her Genial Power, Suckles Each Herb, And Spreads Out Every Flower.

Education Forms The Common Mind. Just As The Twig Is Bent, The Tree's Inclined.

Some Have At First For Wits, Then Poets Passed, Turned Critics Next, And Proved Plain Fools At Last.

Is There A Parson Much Bemused In Beer, A Maudlin Poetess, A Rhyming Peer, A Clerk Foredoom'd His Father's Soul To Cross, Who Pens A Stanza When He Should Engross?

Blest Paper-credit! Last And Best Supply! That Lends Corruption Lighter Wings To Fly!

The Scripture In Times Of Disputes Is Like An Open Town In Times Of War, Which Serves In Differently The Occasions Of Both Parties.

Time Conquers All, And We Must Time Obey.

A Naked Lover Bound And Bleeding Lies!

Great Oaks Grow From Little Acorns. He Has A Green Thumb. He Has Green Fingers. He's Sowing His Wild Oats. Here Ceres' Gifts In Waving Prospect Stand, And Nodding Tempt The Joyful Reaper's Hand.

Pretty Conceptions, Fine Metaphors, Glittering Expressions, And Something Of A Neat Cast Of Verse Are Properly The Dress, Gems, Or Loose Ornaments Of Poetry.

Seas Roll To Waft Me, Suns To Light Me Rise; My Footstool Earth, My Canopy The Skies.

The Approach Of Night The Skies Yet Blushing With Departing Light, When Falling Dews With Spangles Deck'd The Glade, And The Low Sun Had Lengthen'd Ev'ry Shade.

Now Hollow Fires Burn Out To Black, And Lights Are Fluttering Low: Square Your Shoulders, Lift Your Pack And Leave Your Friends And Go. O Never Fear, Lads, Naught's To Dread, Look Not To Left Nor Right: In All The Endless Road You Tread There's Nothing But The Night.

Amusement Is The Happiness Of Those Who Cannot Think.

Leave Not A Foot Of Verse, A Foot Of Stone, A Page, A Grave, That They Can Call Their Own; But Spread, My Sons, Your Glory Thin Or Thick, On Passive Paper, Or On Solid Brick.

Not Grace, Or Zeal, Love Only Was My Call, And If I Lose Thy Love, I Lose My All.

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