Date: 1722

"[B]ut he was really to be pityed in one respect that he seem'd to be a good sort of a Man in himself; a Gentleman that had no harm in his Design; a Man of Sense, and of a fine Behaviour; a comely handsome Person, a sober and solid Countenance, a charming beautiful Face, and every thing that cou'...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1722

"I had the Name of an old Offender, so that I had nothing to expect but Death, neither had I myself any thoughts of escaping, and yet a certain strange Lethargy of Soul possess'd me, I had no Trouble, no Apprehensions, no Sorrow about me, the first Surprize was gone; I was, I may well say, I know...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1722, 1723

"Lord! whatsoever Sorrows Rack my Breast, / Till Crime removes too, let me find no Rest."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1724

"Thus he went on, speaking so chearfully to me, and such chearful things, that it was a Cordial to my very Soul, to hear him speak."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1724

"This was a dreadful Blow to me; tho' I cannot say I was so surpriz'd as I should otherwise have been; for all the while he was gone, my Mind was oppress'd with the Weight of my own Thoughts; and I was as sure that I should never see him any more, that I think nothing could be like it; the Impres...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1724

"His Ignorance was a Cordial to my Soul."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1727

"In Venus the Heat would boil the Water, and consequently the Blood in the Body, and a Set of human Bodies must be form'd that could live always in a hot Bath, and neither sweat out their Souls, or melt their Bodies."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1727

"Homer's Notion of the State of the Dead, was something like the ancient Philosophy of the Aegyptians, which gave the Soul a Shape like the Body, and that it was only a Receptacle of the Mind; the Mind they made to be the sublime and superior Part, and that only."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1727

"It were easie to confute these weak pretences to Chance and Incident, and to show the necessity of an intelligent Being; but that is not my work: I am not upon the Reality of such an intelligent Being, but the Reality of its ordinary and extraordinary actings, the Agents it employs, and the mann...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1727

"But 'tis easily solv'd, by answering that it is but a seeming Contradiction, for both the Apparitions are visible, only not to the same Optick Powers; the Apparition in Dream is visible to the intellectual sight, to the Eye of the Soul; and the Day-light Apparition is visible to the common ordin...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)