William Pak

“I heard a thousand blended notes
While in a grove I sate reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did Nature link
The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.”
― William Wordsworth, Lyrical Ballads

“The principles of a free constitution are irrecoverably lost, when the legislative power is nominated by the executive.”
― Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 1

“Such views the youthful Bard allure,
But, heedless of the following gloom,
He deems their colours shall endure
'Till peace go with him to the tomb.
—And let him nurse his fond deceit,
And what if he must die in sorrow!
Who would not cherish dreams so sweet,
Though grief and pain may come tomorrow?”
― William Wordsworth, Lyrical Ballads

“For a multitude of causes, unknown to former times, are now acting with a combined force to blunt the discriminating powers of the mind, and unfitting it for all voluntary exertion to reduce it to a state of almost savage torpor... To this tendency of life and manners the literature and theatrical exhibitions of the country have conformed themselves.”
― William Wordsworth, Preface to the Lyrical Ballads