Date: 1660
"Things that the least of drossy mixture hold, / Last longest; my Hearts flames Ætherial be, / More pure than seven times refined Gold / Than Cedar's flames: rays of a Deitie / They are."
preview | full record— Pordage, Samuel (bap. 1633, d. c. 1691)
Date: 1660, 1676
"Conscience is the brightness and splendor of the eternal light, a spotless mirror of the Divine Majesty, and the Image of the goodness of God."
preview | full record— Taylor, Jeremy (bap. 1613, 1667)
Date: 1664
"I can only say in general, that the souls of other men shine out at little crannies; they understand some one thing, perhaps to admiration, while they are darkened on all the other parts: but your Lordship's soul is an entire globe of light, breaking out on every side; and if I have only discove...
preview | full record— Dryden, John (1631-1700)
Date: 1667
"Christ the mind fills / With light in us, a tender heart he places; / And files off the Rebellion of our Wills."
preview | full record— Billingsley, Nicholas (bap. 1633, d. 1709)
Date: 1667, 1710
"O be at leisure to look within, and get David's Candle and Lanthorn to go into those dark Corners of your Soul with it, and it may be you may see that within which may make your Heart to ake, and your Joints to quiver, and your Spirits to faint within you."
preview | full record— Janeway, James (1636?-1674)
Date: 1667; 2nd ed. in 1674
"So much the rather thou, celestial Light, / Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers / Irradiate; there plant eyes, all mist from thence / Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell / Of things invisible to mortal sight."
preview | full record— Milton, John (1608-1674)
Date: 1674
"And as for the Bipartition of this Sensitive Soul into two principle members as it were, or active sourses; vix. the Fiery part, upon which Life depends; and the Lucid, from whence all the faculties Animal are, like so many distinct rayes of light, derived."
preview | full record— Charleton, Walter (1620-1707)
Date: 1675
"Well, since that thou dost thus desire to know / What I do Judge this Light within will do; / To satisfie thee I will make no doubt: / Man by this Light may find a God-head out."
preview | full record— Keach, Benjamin (1640-1704)
Date: 1677
"He hath a Lamp, but that Lamp hath no Oyl. / He hath a Soul, but what doth that embrace?"
preview | full record— Speed, Samuel (bap. 1633, d. 1679?)
Date: 1670, rev. 1678
"It's a lightening before death ... This is generally observed of sick persons, that a little before they die their pains leave them, and their understanding and memory return to them; as a candle just before it goes out gives a great blaze."
preview | full record— Ray [formerly Wray], John (1627-1705)