John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby

Read Homer once, and you can read no more; For all books else appear so mean, so poor, Verse will seem prose; but still persist to read, And Homer will be all the books you need.

There's no such thing in Nature; and you'll draw A faultless monster which the world ne’er saw.

Of all those arts in which the wise excel, Nature’s chief masterpiece is writing well.