A good inclination is but the first rude draught of virtue, but the finishing strokes are from the will, which, if well disposed, will by degrees perfect it, as if all disposed will quickly deface it.
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They claim this mother of ours, the Earth, for their own use, and fence their neighbors away from her, and deface her with their buildings and their refuse.
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Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion.
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One stumble is enough to deface the character of an honorable life.
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