“He wrapped himself in quotations - as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.”

The Finest Story in the World http://www.telelib.com/authors/K/KiplingRudyard/prose/ManyInventions/fineststory.html (1893).
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Source: Many Inventions
Context: When next he came to me he was drunk—royally drunk on many poets for the first time revealed to him. His pupils were dilated, his words tumbled over each other, and he wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of emperors.

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English short-story writer, poet, and novelist 1865–1936

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“When next he came to me he was drunk—royally drunk on many poets for the first time revealed to him. His pupils were dilated, his words tumbled over each other, and he wrapped himself in quotations—as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of emperors.”

Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) English short-story writer, poet, and novelist

The Finest Story in the World http://www.telelib.com/authors/K/KiplingRudyard/prose/ManyInventions/fineststory.html (1893).
Other works

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“A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small bundle.”

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790) American author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, …

This seems to have been first attributed to Franklin in The New Age Magazine Vol. 66 (1958), and the earliest appearance of it yet located is in Coronet magazine, Vol. 34 (1953), p. 27, where it was attributed to a Louise Stein; it thus seems likely to have been derived from an earlier statement of Harry Emerson Fosdick, On Being a Real Person (1943) : "At very best, a person wrapped up in himself makes a small package".
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“At very best, a person wrapped up in himself makes a small package.”

Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878–1969) American pastor

A very similar statement has become attributed to Benjamin Franklin, but apparently only in recent decades: "A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small bundle." This seems to have been first attributed to Franklin in The New Age Magazine Vol. 66 (1958), and the earliest appearance of it yet located is in Coronet magazine, Vol. 34 (1953), p. 27, where it was attributed to a Louise Stein.
On Being a Real Person (1943)

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“If wishes were butter-cakes, beggars might bite.
If wishes were thrushes, beggars would eat birds.
If wishes would bide, beggars would ride.”

John Ray (1627–1705) British botanist

Source: English Proverbs (1670), p. 174

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