“Think'st thou there are no serpents in the world
But those who slide along the grassy sod,
And sting the luckless foot that presses them?
There are who in the path of social life
Do bask their spotted skins in Fortune's sun,
And sting the soul.”

—  Joanna Baillie

De Montfort (1798), Act I, scene 2; in A Series of Plays.

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Joanna Baillie photo
Joanna Baillie 10
Scottish poet and dramatist 1762–1851

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