Date: 1706
"The Marble Heart groans with an inward Wound: / Blaspheming Souls of harden'd Steel / Shriek out amaz'd at the new Pangs they feel, / And dread the Eccho's of the Sound."
preview | full record— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)
Date: 1737 (also 1738, 1743, reprinted 1754)
"Curst with such souls of base alloy, / As can possess, but not enjoy, / Debarr'd the pleasure to impart / By av'rice, sphincter of the heart, / Who wealth, hard earn'd by guilty cares, / Bequeath untouch'd to thankless heirs."
preview | full record— Green, Matthew (1696-1737)
Date: 1758
"COME, Epictetus, arm my breast / With thy impenetrable steel, / No more the wounds of grief to feel, / Nor mourn, by others' woes deprest."
preview | full record— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)
Date: 1764, 1773
"But 'tis not Gomez, 'tis not he whose heart / Is crusted o'er with dross, whose callous mind / Is senseless as his gold."
preview | full record— Shenstone, William (1714-1763)
Date: 1788
"When the sharp iron wounds his inmost soul, / And his strain'd eyes in burning anguish roll; / Will the parch'd negro find, ere he expire, / No pain in hunger, and no heat in fire?"
preview | full record— More, Hannah (1745-1833)
Date: 1789
"'Is there a Man, who, wealthy to no end, / 'Ne'er knew the common wish to be a Friend, / 'Whose callous Heart's to all Compassion steel'd?"
preview | full record— Combe, William (1742 -1823)
Date: 1823
The "venom'd shafts" of Cupid "empoison mortal joy," "Drawing from heav'n the soul of man to earth, / With foul alloy debasing purest treasure."
preview | full record— Burges, Sir James Bland (1752-1824)
Date: 1868
"The strong man arm'd this moment bind, / The bold usurper of Thy throne, / His armour seize, the carnal mind, / The unbelieving heart of stone, / Out of my flesh the evil tear, / And pluck my soul out of the snare."
preview | full record— Wesley, John and Charles
Date: 1868
"We ask a soul no longer blind, / Who chased the darkness of thy mind, / Open'd thine inward eyes to see / That all on earth is vanity"
preview | full record— Wesley, John and Charles