Date: 1749

"[I]t would be an ill Office in us to pay a Visit to the inmost Recesses of his Mind, as some scandalous People search into the most secret Affairs of their Friends, and often pry into their Closets and Cupboards only to discover their Poverty and Meanness to the World."

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1752

"But, in order to place this momentous Affair in a true Light, 'tis necessary to go back a little, and acquaint the Reader with what had passed in the Apartment; and also, following the Custom of the Romance and novel-Writers, in the Heart, of our Heroine"

— Lennox, née Ramsay, (Barbara) Charlotte (1730/1?-1804)

Date: 1752

"His Flattery had made such a Dupe of my Aunt, that she assented, without the least Suspicion of his Sincerity, to all he said; so sure is Vanity to weaken every Fortress of the Understanding, and to betray us to every Attack of the Enemy."

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1752

"'But you understand Human Nature to the Bottom,' answered Amelia;' and your Mind is a Treasury of all ancient and modern Learning.'"

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1752

The heart is a fortress on a rock

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1752

"Whether Amelia's Beauty, or the Reflexion on the remarkable Act of Justice he had performed, or whatever Motive filled the Magistrate with extraordinary good Humour, and opened his Heart and Cellars, I will not determine;"

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1753

"Though the soul, like a hermit in his cell, sits quiet in the bosom, unruffled by any tempest of its own, it suffers from the rude blasts of others faults"

— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)

Date: 1753

"[M]ight I not hope my love, my truth, my perseverance, would in time find some room in a corner of that heart which doubtless then would have exterminated its first ideas.'"

— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)

Date: 1754

"My heart is too big for its prison, putting her hand to it: It wants room, methinks"

— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)

Date: 1759

"Even this Piece of Wisdom did not find its Way into his Mind by Reflexion (that Passage for its Entrance had long been too closely barricadoed), but came in at his Eyes, and engaged his constant Counsellors, his Inclinations, on the Side of a fair Object he had accidentally beheld, at the House ...

— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)