Date: 1641
"I am not that structure of limbs which is called a human body. I am not even some thin vapour which permeates the limbs - a wind, fire, air, breath, or whatever I depict in my imagination; for these are things which I have supposed to be nothing."
preview | full record— Descartes, René (1596-1650)
Date: 1688
"But Love, who had hitherto but play'd with her Heart, and given it naught but pleasing, wanton Wounds, such as afforded only soft Joys, and not Pains, resolv'd, either out of Revenge to those Numbers she had abandon'd, and who had sigh'd so long in vain; or to try what power he had upon so fickl...
preview | full record— Behn, Aphra (1640?-1689)
Date: 1727
"It is without Doubt, that Fancy and Imagination form a world of Apparitions in the Minds of Men and Women; (for we must not exclude the Ladies in this Part, whatever we do) and People go away as thoroughly possess'd with the Reality of having seen the Devil, as if they convers'd Face to Face wit...
preview | full record— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)
Date: 1741-2
"When no malignant fever fires the brain, / And health luxuriant revels in each vein, / Tho' sunk in sloth, from all diseases free, / In dropsies, you will run to Reeve or Lee."
preview | full record— Gilbert, Thomas (bap. 1713, d. 1766)
Date: 1744, 1772, 1795
"Else wherefore burns / In mortal bosoms this unquenched hope, / That breathes from day to day sublimer things, / And mocks possession?"
preview | full record— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)
Date: 1751
"Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid / Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire."
preview | full record— Gray, Thomas (1716-1771)
Date: 1755
Affections may seem benumbed or may take take fire
preview | full record— Hooker [from Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language]
Date: 1755
"However, I must beg Leave to inform those Ladies and Gentlemen, whose Tenderness and Compassion may excite 'em to make this little Brat of my Brain the Companion of an idle Hour, that I have paid all due Regard to Decency wherever I have introduc'd the Passion of Love; and have only suffer'd it ...
preview | full record— Charke [née Cibber; other married name Sacheverell], Charlotte [alias Mr Brown] (1713-1760)
Date: 1756, 1793
"My heart is pregnant, and my soul on fire"
preview | full record— Blacklock, Thomas (1721-1791)
Date: 1773
The soul contains "An embryo of God, a spark of fire divine / Which must burn on for ages."
preview | full record— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)