Let's Go to the Bar, Part II (Golden Age)

“The proprieties and delicacies of the English are known to few; ‘tis impossible even for a good wit to understand and practice them without the help of a liberal education, long reading, and digesting of those few good authors we have amongst us, the knowledge of men and manners, the freedom of habitudes and conversation with the best company of both sexes; and in short, without wearing off the rust which he contracted, while he was laying in a stock of learning.”

—John Dryden, Preface to Sylva