Quote: James Boswell

DEMPSTER: We have hardly a right to abuse this tragedy; for bad as it is, how vain should either of us be to write one not near so good.

JOHNSON: Why no, Sir; this is not just reasoning. You may abuse a tragedy, though you cannot write one. You may scold a carpenter who has made you a bad table, though you cannot make a table. It is not your trade to make tables.

This bit of (apparently truthful) dialogue is excerpted from James Boswell’s biography of Samuel Johnson, Life of Johnson. “Johnson” is eponymous; “Dempster” is I know not whom. I came across this in the foreword to my copy of Milton’s Paradise Lost (which, no, I never got through). Well said, sir.