Date: 1751

"There are few among Mankind, who have not been often struck with Admiration at the Sight of that Variety of Colours and Magnificence of Form, which appear in an Evening Rainbow. The uninstructed in Philosophy consider that splendid Object, not as dependent on any other, but as being possessed of...

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1752, 1791

"Thy appetites in easy tides / (As reason's luminary guides) / Soft flow--no wind can work them to a storm, / Correctly quick, dispassionately warm."

— Smart, Christopher (1722-1771)

Date: 1752

"Weak, impotent, yet wishing to be free, / You are by much a greater Slave, than me; / A Slave, to ev'ry Gust that shakes your Mind, / Your Eyes broad open, and your Senses blind."

— Duncombe, John (1729-1786) [pseud.]

Date: Tuesday, August 14, 1753

"But from the opposite errour, from torpid despondency, can come no advantage; it is the frost of the soul, which binds up all its powers, and congeals life in perpetual sterility."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1755

"Thy Words have shot like Lightning through my Frame; / And all my Soul's on Fire!"

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1755

"Hence--to thy Chamber, till returning Reason / Hath calm'd this Tempest."

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1755

A beam of brightness may break on the mind and "drive errors cloud away / & make a calm in passions troubled sea"

— Parnell, Thomas (1679-1718)

Date: 1759

"Imlac was delighted to find that the sage's understanding was breaking through its mists, and resolved to detain him from the planets till he should forget his task of ruling them, and reason should recover its original influence."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1760-7

The "little interests below" may "rise up and perplex the faculties of our upper regions, and encompass them about with clouds and thick darkness."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1760-7

"So that upon his first setting out, the brisk gale of his spirits, as you will imagine, ran him foul ten times in a day of some body's tackling; and as the grave and more slow-paced were oftenest in his way,—you may likewise imagine, 'twas with such he had generally the ill luck to get the most ...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)