But do, first of all, for God's-sake, put away your pistol; you handle it as if you were a cockatrice; some time or other, depend upon it, it will certainly go off.

Here is your hat.

No, let me put it on square, and the wig before it.

Never suffer any stress of circumstances to come between you and the duty you owe to yourself.
If you have nobody else to dress for, dress for God! 'Put your wig straight On your bald pate, Keep your chin scraped, And your figure draped.
Can you match me that?
The whole duty of man in a quatrain! And remark, I do not set up to be a professional bard; these are the outpourings of a _dilettante_.' 'But, my dear sir!' he exclaimed.
'But, my dear sir!' I echoed, 'I will allow no man to interrupt the flow of my ideas.

Give me your opinion on my quatrain, or I vow we shall have a quarrel of it.' 'Certainly you are quite an original,' he said.
'Quite,' said I; 'and I believe I have my counterpart before me.' 'Well, for a choice,' says he, smiling, 'and whether for sense or poetry, give me '"Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow: The rest is all but leather and prunello."' 'Oh, but that's not fair--that's Pope! It's not original, Dudgeon.
Understand me,' said I, wringing his breast-button, 'the first duty of all poetry is to be mine, sir--mine.