"Language is the dress of thought; and as the noblest mien or most graceful action would be degraded and obscured by a garb appropriated to the gross employments of rusticks or mechanicks, so the most heroick sentiments will lose their efficacy, and the most splendid ideas drop their magnificence, if they are conveyed by words used commonly upon low and trivial occasions, debased by vulgar mouths, and contaminated by inelegant applications."
Life of Cowley [from Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, to the Works of the English Poets, familiarly known as The Lives of the Poets]
At least 3 entries in ESTC (1779, 1781, 1790). [vols. 1 to 5 dated 1779, vols. 5 to 10, 1781)<br>
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Samuel Johnson, <u>Prefaces, Biographical and Critical, to the Works of the English Poets</u>, vol. 1 (London: Bathurst et al., 1779). &lt;<a href="http://estc.bl.uk/T44190">Link to ESTC</a>&gt;&lt;<a href="http://find.galegroup.com/ecco/infomark.do?&contentSet=ECCOArticles&type=multipage&tabID=T001&prodId=ECCO&docId=CW3310180104&source=gale&userGroupName=viva_uva&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE">Link to ECCO</a>&gt;<br> 
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 Text from Jack Lynch's online edition, based on G. B. Hill's  <u>Lives of the English Poets</u>, 3 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1905). &lt;<a href="http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Texts/milton.html">Link</a>&gt;