Date: 1757

"And whatever any talk of (the rasa tabula,) an indifferency by nature, to virtue or vice: never could I find any such thing; but all men inclined the wrong way: and abundance of work, by discipline, and the grace of God, to make any one better than the rest."

— Jenks, Benjamin (bap. 1648, d. 1724)

Date: 1759, performed 1776

"(If shapes like his be but the fancy's coinage)"

— Mason, William (1725-1797)

Date: 1759, performed 1776

"Steel then, ye Powers of heav'n, / Steel my firm soul with your own fortitude, / Free from alloy of passion."

— Mason, William (1725-1797)

Date: 1759, performed 1776

The soul may be "Snatch'd by the power of music from her cell / Of fleshly thraldom" and feel "herself upborn / On plumes of ecstasy"

— Mason, William (1725-1797)

Date: 1761

"Soft pity may touch the manly Breast, / And on thy soul mild Nature's stamp imprest"

— Jerningham, Edward (1727-1812)

Date: 1761

"Ye Pow'rs above my Breast with courage steel, / That when the Hour arrives, I may not feel / A Mother's weakness melting this sad Heart"

— Jerningham, Edward (1727-1812)

Date: w. 1764

"Take the bloody seal I give thee, / Deep impressed upon thy soul."

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

Date: 1765 [1764]

"Manfred, who, though he had distinguished her by great indulgence, had imprinted her mind with terror from his causeless rigour to such amiable princesses as Hippolita and Matilda."

— Walpole, Horatio [Horace], fourth earl of Orford (1717-1797)

Date: 1765 [1764]

"Arriving there, he sought the gloomiest shades, as best suited to the pleasing melancholy that reigned in his mind."

— Walpole, Horatio [Horace], fourth earl of Orford (1717-1797)

Date: 1765 [1764]

"Alone in so dismal a place, her mind imprinted with all the terrible events of the day, hopeless of escaping, expecting every moment the arrival of Manfred, and far from tranquil on knowing she was within reach of somebody, she knew not whom, who for some cause seemed concealed thereabouts,...

— Walpole, Horatio [Horace], fourth earl of Orford (1717-1797)