Date: 1744, 1772, 1795
"Passion's fierce illapse / Rouzes the mind's whole fabric; with supplies / Of daily impulse keeps the elastic powers / Intensely poiz'd, and polishes anew / By that collision all the fine machine: / Else rust would rise, and foulness, by degrees / Incumbering, choak at last what heaven design'd ...
preview | full record— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)
Date: 1745
"Imagination is the Paphian shop, / Where feeble Happiness, like Vulcan, lame, / Bids foul Ideas, in their dark recess, / And hot as hell, (which kindled the black fires,) / With wanton art, those fatal arrows form / Which murder all thy time, health, wealth, and fame."
preview | full record— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)
Date: 1782
The Muse, like Cato, "Well [...] supplies her want of softer art / By all the sterling treasures of the heart."
preview | full record— Hayley, William (1745-1820)
Date: 1786, 1787, 1788; 1789
"So poignant a mind in a vulgariz'd shell,/ Resembles a bucket of gold in a well; / 'Tis like Ceylon's best spice in a rude-fashion'd jar, / Or Comedy coop'd in a Dutch man of war."
preview | full record— Williams, John [pseud. Anthony Pasquin] (1754-1818)
Date: w. 1794, 1797
"'Tis only those of purer clay / 'From sensual dross refined, / 'In whom the passions pleas'd obey / 'The God within the mind, / 'Who share my delegated aid, / 'Through Wisdom's golden mean convey'd / 'From the first source of sov'reign good."
preview | full record— Mason, William (1725-1797)
Date: 1802
"Is prouder yet in sterling worth to shine, / Stamp'd by the friendship of a mind like thine"
preview | full record— Pye, Henry James (1745-1813)
Date: 1805
"Your Worth and Talents will unfold, / Richer than Needlework of Gold; / The native treasures of the soul, / True--as the Needle to the Pole."
preview | full record— Pratt, Samuel Jackson [pseud. Courtney Melmoth] (1749-1814)
Date: 1805
"And the gay vein of sportive Sense / Enrich'd by sterling Innocence; / Th'undrossy treasures of the Mind / Good-humour'd, graceful, and refin'd; / And, rivalling the Seers of old, / Whate'er you touch transmutes to Gold."
preview | full record— Pratt, Samuel Jackson [pseud. Courtney Melmoth] (1749-1814)
Date: 1807-8
"Thus with the show of reason, but with hearts, / By faction tainted, and by envy steel'd / Against their youthful leader, they had hop'd / By these inglorious councils to degrade / And tarnish his high fame."
preview | full record— Burges, Sir James Bland (1752-1824)
Date: 1817
"But he, the bard of every age and clime, / Of genius fruitful, ardent and sublime, / Who, from the glowing mint of fancy, pours / No spurious metal, fused from common ores, / But gold, to matchless purity refined, / And stamp'd with all the godhead in his mind."
preview | full record— Gifford, William (1756-1826)