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Date: 1767

"Thou mayst remember after this period, that, sated with voluptuousness, thy licentious heart began to grow hardened; and from rioting without controul in pleasures, which, however criminal in themselves, carry at least with them the excuse of temptation, thou wantonly didst stir up, and indulge ...

— Sheridan [née Chamberlaine], Frances (1724-1766)

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Date: October 10, 1769

"My imagination without wing or broom stick off mounts aloft, rises into ye Regions of pure space, and without lett or impediment bears me to your fireside, where you can set me in your easy chair, and we talk and reason, as angel Host and guest Aetherial should do, of high and important matters."

— Montagu [née Robinson], Elizabeth (1718-1800)

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Date: 1769

"Deprived by their extreme ignorance, and that indolence which nothing but their ardor for war can surmount, of all the conveniencies, as well as elegant refinements of polished life; strangers to the softer passions, love being with them on the same footing as amongst their fellow-tenants of the...

— Brooke [née Moore], Frances (bap. 1724, d. 1789)

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Date: 1773

"Not all the storms that shake the pole / Can e'er disturb thy halcyon soul, / And smooth unaltered brow."

— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)

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Date: 1773

"Till every worldly thought within me dies, / And earth's gay pageants vanish from my eyes; / Till all my sense is lost in infinite, / And one vast object fills my aching sight."

— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)

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Date: 1773

"Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies, / Till some lov'd objects strikes her wand'ring eyes, / Whose silken fetters all the senses bind, / And soft captivity involves the mind."

— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)

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Date: 1773

"Soaring though air to find the bright abode, / Th' empyreal palace of the thund'ring God, / We on thy pinions can surpass the wind, / And leave the rolling universe behind; / From star to star the mental optics rove, / Measure the skies, and range the realms above."

— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)

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Date: 1773

"Fancy might now her silken pinions try  / To rise from earth, and sweep th' expanse on high"

— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)

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Date: 1773

"Instead of contemplating our own fancied perfections, or even real superiority with self-complacence, religion will teach us to 'look into ourselves, and fear:' the best of us, God knows, have enough to fear, if we honestly search into all the dark recesses of the heart, and bring out every thou...

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

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Date: 1773

"By accustoming yourself thus to conquer and disappoint your anger, you will, by degrees, find it grow weak and manageable, so as to leave your reason at liberty."

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.