A good style, with good matter, consecrates a work to memory; and sometimes, while a man seeks
but one of these, he is caught to be a servant to the other. The principal end of reading is to enrich the
mind; the next, to improve the pen and tongue. Doubtless, that is the best work in which the Graces and
the Muses meet.
Certainly the breathing and effusions of a devout soul turn prayer into a chain, which links us fast to
God; but intermission breaks it, and when we are so loose we are easily overthrown; and doubtless it is
far less difficult to preserve a friend, once made, than to recover one that is lost.