Date: 1745

"Off! Traitors! off! or my distracted Soul / Will burst indignant from this Jail of Nature! / To where she beckons yonder."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1745

"Ha! my Brain / Is all on fire! a wild Abyss of Thought!"

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1745

"Behold the fatal Work of my dark Hand, / That by rude Force the Passions would command, / That ruthless sought to root them from the Breast; / They may be rul'd, but will not be opprest."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1745

"And, in my Opinion, we have as much need of the Hand of Culture to call forth our latent Powers, to direct their Exercise; in fine, to shape and polish us into Men, as the unformed Block has of the Craver or Statuary's Skill, to draw it out of that rude State, into the Form and Proportions of a ...

— Fordyce, David (bap. 1711, d. 1751)