Famous quotes containing the word precept:
“His talk was like a spring, which runs
With rapid change from rocks to roses:
It slipped from politics to puns,
It passed from Mahomet to Moses;
Beginning with the laws which keep
The planets in their radiant courses,
And ending with some precept deep
For dressing eels, or shoeing horses.”
—Winthrop Mackworth Praed (1802–1839)
“If ever I should condescend to prose,
I’ll write poetical commandments, which
Shall supersede beyond all doubt all those
That went before; in these I shall enrich
My text with many things that no one knows,
And carry precept to the highest pitch:
I’ll call the work ‘Longinus o’er a Bottle,
Or, Every Poet his own Aristotle.’”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“This laudable quality is commonly known by the name of Manners and Good- breeding, and consists in a Fashionable Habit, acquir’d by Precept and Example, of flattering the Pride and Selfishness of others, and concealing our own with Judgment and Dexterity.”
—Bernard De Mandeville (1670–1733)