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"Seldom we find," says Solomon Don Dunce,
    "Half an idea in the profoundest sonnet.
Through all the flimsy things we see at once
    As easily as through a Naples bonnet--
    Trash of all trash!--how _can_ a lady don it?
Yet heavier far than your Petrarchan stuff--
Owl-downy nonsense that the faintest puff
    Twirls into trunk-paper the while you con it."
And, veritably, Sol is right enough.
The general tuckermanities are arrant
Bubbles--ephemeral and _so_ transparent--
    But _this is_, now--you may depend upon it--
Stable, opaque, immortal--all by dint
Of the dear names that lie concealed within't.
1847.
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