Date: 1681

"In Pow'r unpleas'd, impatient of Disgrace. / A fiery Soul, which working out its way, / Fretted the Pigmy-Body to decay; / And o'r inform'd the Tenement of Clay."

— Dryden, John (1631-1700)

Date: 1692

"Or grant some Knowledge dwells below, / 'Tis but for some few years to stay / Till I'm set loose from this dark House of Clay, / And in an Instant I shall all things know."

— Norris, John (1657-1712)

Date: 1697

"Our Senses to the Mind while lodg'd in Clay, / Do all their various Images convey. / Things that we tast, and feel, and see, afford / The Seeds of Thought with which our Minds are stor'd."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1715

"Or can they ought that's mean, when God has set / A Jewel in their earthly Cabinet?"

— Wesley, Samuel, The Elder (bap. 1662, d. 1735)

Date: 1724

"This cold clay cottage is but the soul's prison, / And death, at worst, is but a surly friend, / Who conquers to give liberty."

— Savage, Richard (1697/8-1743)

Date: 1728, 1729, 1736

"She form'd this image of well-bodied air, / With pert flat eyes she window'd well its head, / A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead, / And empty words she gave, and sounding strain, / But senseless, lifeless! idol void and vain!"

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: 1735, 1745

"Only to trifle sev'nty Years away / In this frail Flesh, this Tenement of Clay, / In Doubt, in Fear, in Sorrow, in Despair, / Then cease to be, and vanish into Air?"

— Trapp, Joseph (1679-1747)

Date: 1742

"My soul is dead, my heart is stone, / A cage of birds and beasts unclean, / A den of thieves, a dire abode / Of dragons, but no house of God."

— Wesley, John and Charles

Date: 1743

"In that dread Moment, how the frantick Soul / Raves round the Walls of her Clay Tenement, / Runs to each Avenue, and shrieks for Help, / But shrieks in vain!"

— Blair, Robert (1699-1746)

Date: 1743

"Dearly pays the soul / For lodging ill; too dearly rents her clay."

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)