Though A Man Cannot Abstain From Being

I Value My Garden More For Being Full Of Blackbirds Than Of Cherries, And Very Frankly Give Them Fruit For Their Songs.

It Is Of Unspeakable Advantage To Possess Our Minds With An Habitual Good Intention, And To Aim All Our Thoughts, Words, And Actions At Some Laudable End.

Music, When Thus Applied, Raises Noble Hints In The Mind Of The Hearer, And Fills It With Great Conceptions. It Strengthens Devotion, And Advances Praise Into Rapture.

Musick Is Certainly A Very Agreeable Entertainment, But If It Would Take The Entire Possession Of Our Ears, If It Would Make Us Incapable Of Hearing Sense, If It Would Exclude Arts That Have A Much Greater Tendency To The Refinement Of Human Nature; I Must Confess I Would Allow It No Better Quarter Than Plato Has Done, Who Banishes It Out Of His Common-wealth.

It Is Folly To Seek The Approbation Of Any Being Besides The Supreme.