[…] he has 'overlaid' his book, and has not succeeded in 'getting round' by bets against the other horses.

All that was Good and Holy, is dethron’d, And Lust, and Rapine are for justice own’d.

In the old days, to my commonplace and unobserving mind, he gave no evidences of genius whatsoever. He never read me any of his manuscripts, […], and therefore my lack of detection of his promise may in some degree be pardoned.

People whose heads are a little up in the world, have no occasion to keep their nose to the grindstone.