...calm unfit, Would steer too nigh the sands, to boast his wit. Great-wits ate-sure-to madness. .pear allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide ; {Else why should he, with wealth and honour blest, ' ^Refuse his age the needful hours of rest ? Punish a body which he could not please ; Bankrupt...

...he returns home, he buys a seat in parliament, and studies the constitution. — Machenzie. CCCCXCVL Great wits are sure to madness near allied. And thin...bless'd, Refuse his age the needful hours of rest 1 Punish a body which he could not please ; Bankrupt of life, yet prodigal of ease ? And all to leave...

...sought the storms ; but, for a calm unfit, Would steer too nigh the sands to boast his wit. Great wits5 are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions...divide ; Else why should he, with wealth and honour blest, Refuse his age the needful hours of rest ? Punish a body which he could not please ; Bankrupt...

...its way, Fretted the pigmy body to decay, And o'er informed the tenement of clay. Part i. Line 163.. Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide. Part i. Line 169. And all to leave what with his toil he won, To that unfeather'd two-legg'd thing,...

...and rendered confinement necessary for the sake of themselves and of others. If it be true, that " Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide," it will be admitted that great depravity stands very much in the same relation to madness. Indeed,...

...high, He sought the storms; but, for a calm unfit, Would steer too nigh the sands, to boast his wit. Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide." Or, in the lines which he sent to Tonson the publisher as a specimen of what he could do in the way...

...his family, in the character of Achitophel : — ' Else why should he, with wealth and honours blest, Refuse his age the needful hours of rest? Punish a...could not please; Bankrupt of life, yet prodigal of case. And all to leave what with his toil he won, To that unfeather'd two legg'd thing, a son.' A new...

...unceremoniously purloined as Seneca. From him Dryden has adopted the first line of the well-known couplet : — " Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide." And from Dryden, Pope has transferred the last line to his " Essay on Man," thus : — " What thin...

...high He sought the storms, but for a calm unfit, "Would steer too nigh the sands to boast his wit. Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide. In friendship false, implacable in hate, Resolved to ruin or to rule th« state. To compass this the...

...versus fecit . Satirically made a synonyme for insanit. Cp. Ars Poet. 296. Dryden's lines are famous : Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide. Absalom and Ahithopbel. (operis dandis, Cic. Farad, vi.; U understood by many in this sense ; though...