It is with literature as with law or empire - an established name is an estate in tenure, or a throne in possession.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revelers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.

Every poem should remind the reader that they are going to die.

I remained too much inside my head and ended up losing my mind.

I need scarcely observe that a poem deserves its title only inasmuch as it excites, by elevating the soul. The value of the poem is in the ratio of this elevating excitement. But all excitements are, through a psychal necessity, transient.

To die laughing must be the most glorious of all glorious deaths!

In for ever knowing, we are for ever blessed; but to know all were the curse of a fiend