Receive, dear friend, the truths I teach,
So shalt thou live beyond the reach
Of adverse Fortune's pow'r;
Not always tempt the distant deep,
Nor always timorously creep
Along the treach'rous shore.
Too indolent to bear the toil of writing; I mean of writing well; I say nothing about quantity.
[Lat., Piger scribendi ferre laborem;
Scribendi recte, nam ut multum nil moror.]