Date: 1774

"A parcel of warm hearts and inexperienced heads, heated by convivial mirth, and possibly a little too much wine, vow, and really mean at the time, eternal friendships to each other, and indiscreetly pour out their whole souls in common, and without the least reserve."

— Stanhope, Philip Dormer, fourth earl of Chesterfield (1694-1773)

Date: 1777

"She passed the night without rest; the ideas of coaches, coronets, titles, filled her mind, and effectually murdered sleep."

— Brooke [née Moore], Frances (bap. 1724, d. 1789)

Date: 1779, 1781

"The man that sits down to suppose himself charged with treason or peculation, and heats his mind to an elaborate purgation of his character from crimes which he was never within the possibility of committing, differs only by the infrequency of his folly from him who praises beauty which he never...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1779, 1781

"Still, however, it is the work of Cowley, of a mind capacious by nature, and replenished by study."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1779, 1781

"Thus, comparing the shield of Satan to the orb of the Moon, he crowds the imagination with the discovery of the telescope and all the wonders which the telescope discovers"

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1779, 1781

"Whatever be his subject he never fails to fill the imagination."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1784

"And hence it will follow, that with the foregoing exceptions, we may, among Europeans, bring genius to actual admeasurement, and determine its degrees by the size of the possessor's head, just as an exciseman gauges a beer barrel."

— Ramsay, James (1733-1789)