Date: 1712

"And tho' these Spirits, which obsequious go, / Know not the Paths, thro' which they ready flow, / Nor can our Mind instruct them in their Way, / Of all their Roads as ignorant, as they; / Yet seldom erring they attain their End, / And reach that single Part, which we intend."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1712

"How Spirits, which for Sense and Motion serve, / Unguided find the perforated Nerve. / Thro' ev'ry dark Recess pursue their Flight, / Unconscious of the Road and void of Sight, / Yet certain of the End still guide their Motions right."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1723

"Thou see'st from whence her Colours Fancy takes, / Of what Materials she her Pencil makes / By which she paints her Scenes with such Applause, / And in the Brain ten thousand Landskips draws."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1723

"Thou know'st the downy Chains that softly bind / Our slumb'ring Sense, when waiting Objects find / No Avenue left open to the Mind."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1746

Imagination may play "Unbridled in the fields of day, / Thro endless time, and boundless space, / Continue unrestrain'd her race"

— Cooke, Thomas (1703-1756)

Date: 1748

"Thus on the sands of Afric's burning plains, / However deeply made, no long impress remains; / The lightest leaf can leave its figure there; / The strongest form is scattered by the air. / So yielding the warm temper of your mind,"

— Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley [née Lady Mary Pierrepont] (1689-1762)

Date: 1748

The mind or heart may be like rock: "So numerous herds are driven o'er the rock, / No print is left of all the passing flock; / So sings the wind around the solid stone, / So vainly beat the waves with fruitless moan"

— Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley [née Lady Mary Pierrepont] (1689-1762)

Date: 1755, 1771

"Were it not so, the soul, all dead and lost, / Like the tall cliff beneath the' impassive frost, / Form'd for no end, and impotent to please, / Would lie inactive on the couch of ease: / And, heedless of proud fame's immortal lay, / Sleep all her dull divinity away."

— Cawthorn, James (1719-1761)