...us, light and choice, Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise To hear the lute well touched, or artful voice Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air? He who of those delights can judge, and spare To interpose them oft, is not unwise. — from a sonnet by John...

...transgression" (CPW 1:890). The sonnet ends with a gnomic distillation of its moderate ethos: "He who of those delights can judge, and spare / To interpose them oft, is not unwise" (ll. 13-14). Critics have long disputed as to whether "spare" means "refrain" or "afford (time)," though...