Date: Saturday, October 20, 1711

"It is certain, the Propensity of the Mind to Religious Worship; the natural Tendency of the Soul to fly to some Superior Being for Succour in Dangers and Distresses, the Gratitude to an invisible Superintendent which rises in us upon receiving any extraordinary and unexpected good Fortune; the A...

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: Saturday, October 27, 1711

"Let him remove from my Mind, says Alcibiades, the Darkness, and what else he pleases, I am determined to refuse nothing he shall order me, whoever he is, so that I may become the better Man by it."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: Saturday, October 27, 1711

"However that may be, we find that this great Philosopher saw, by the Light of Reason, that it was suitable to the Goodness of the Divine Nature, to send a Person into the World who should instruct Mankind in the Duties of Religion, and, in particular, teach them how to Pray."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: 1711

Popes, "Who, as erroneus, Nature's Light asperse; / The Judgment, which our Senses pass, reverse; / And by th' usurp'd Authority of Heav'n / Repeal the just Decrees by Reason given: / Who Schemes of new Religion have enjoined, / Impos'd Belief, enslav'd the free-born Mind, / And artful by the man...

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: w. c. 1709, 1711

"As on the land while here the Ocean gains, / In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains; / Thus in the soul while memory prevails, / The solid pow'r of understanding fails; / Where beams of warm imagination play, / The memory's soft figures melt away."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: 1712

"And as the Sun by his own Heat exhales / Clouds from the Sea, and Fogs from marshy Vales; / Which (tho' base-born) ambitious higher move, / Prevent the Light, and hide the Worlds above. / So from corporeal Dregs the Mists condense, / And intercept the Messengers of Sense."

— Cobb, Samuel (1675-1713); Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718); Quillet, Claudius (fl.1640-1656)

Date: 1712

"The clouded Images their March delay, / Till the rouz'd Soul, by a superiour Ray / Breaks thro' the Shade, and urges on the Day."

— Cobb, Samuel (1675-1713); Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718); Quillet, Claudius (fl.1640-1656)

Date: Saturday, April 5, 1712

"He likewise is represented as discovering by the Light of Reason, that he and every thing about him must have been the Effect of some Being infinitely good and powerful, and that this Being had a right to his Worship and Adoration."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: Saturday, May 17, 1712

"Mirth is like a Flash of Lightning, that breaks thro a Gloom of Clouds, and glitters for a Moment; Chearfulness keeps up a kind of Day-light in the Mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual Serenity."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: Wednesday, June 4, 1712

"It fills the Imagination with an Assemblage of such Ideas and Pictures as are hardly any thing but Shade, such as Night, the Devil, &c. These Portraitures very near over-power the Light of the Understanding, almost benight the Faculties, and give that melancholy Tincture to the most sanguine Com...

— Steele, Sir Richard (1672-1729)