Date: 1706

"But FANCY, that unease Guest / Still holds a Lodging in our Beast; / She finds or frames Vexations still, / Her self the greatest Plague we feel."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1718

Were it not for the Optic Nerves, the eyes might conspire the ruin of the mind: "That They shou'd see and She be blind."

— Prior, Matthew (1664-1721)

Date: 1741

"Without Memory the Soul of Man would be but a poor destitute naked Being, with an everlasting Blank spread over it, except the fleeting ideas of the present Moment."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1741

"Such practices may happen to discourage and jade the Mind by an Attempt above its Power, it may balk the Understanding, and create an Aversion to future Diligence, and perhaps by Despair may forbid the Pursuit of that subject for ever afterwards; as a Limb over-strained by lifting a Weight above...

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1741

"Yet there should be a Caution given in some Cases: the Memory of a Child or any infirm person should not be over-burdened; for a Limb or a Joint may be overstrained by being too much loaded, and its natural Power never be recovered."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1773

"[Y]et so much more is the understanding blinded, when once the fancy is captivated, that it seems a desperate undertaking to convince a girl in love that she has mistaken the character of the man she prefers."

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: 1773

"The resentment which, instead of being expressed, is nursed in secret, and continually aggravated by the imagination, will, in time, become the ruling passion; and then, how horrible must be his case, whose kind and pleasurable affections are all swallowed up by the tormenting as well as detesta...

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: 1775

"[T]here may be a farther difference in the constitution of the nerves belonging to the different senses, or there may be so many circumstances that affect or modify their vibrations, that they may be as distinguishable from one another, as different human voices sounding the same note; and proba...

— Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804)

Date: 1775

"To lessen this difficulty a little, let it be considered how exceedingly different, to the eye of the mind, as we may say, are our ideas of sensible things from any thing that could have been conjectured concerning their effect upon us."

— Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804)

Date: 1850

"[S]ometimes, 'tis true, / By chance collisions and quaint accidents / (Like those ill-sorted unions, work supposed / Of evil-minded fairies), yet not vain / Nor profitless, if haply they impressed / Collateral objects and appearances, / Albeit lifeless then, and doomed to sleep / Until maturer s...

— Wordsworth, William (1770-1850)