Date: 1710, 1714

"Either I work upon my Fancys, or They on Me. If I give Quarter, They won't. There can be no Truce, no Suspension of Arms between us. The one or the other must be superiour, and have the Command. For if the Fancys are left to themselves, the G...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"How stands it therefore, in my own Oeconomy, my principal Province and Command? How stand my Fancys? How deal they with me? Or do I take upon me rather to deal with Them? Do I talk, question, arraign? Or am I talk'd with, arraign'd, and contented to hear, without giving a Reply? If I vote with F...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"But let my Senses err ever so widely; I am not on this account beside my-self: Nor am I out of my own Possession, whilst there is a Person left within; who has Power to dispute the Appearances, and redress the Imagination."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"Lady-Fancy was not aware of the Design upon her; but let her-self be worm'd out, by degrees."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"Fancy in the mean while carry'd her point: For she was absolute over the Monarch; and had been too little talk'd to by her-self, to bear being reprov'd in Company. The Prince grew sullen; turn'd the Discourse; abhor'd the Profanation offer'd to his Sovereign-Empress; deliver'd up his Thoughts to...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"'Tis easy to bring the Hero's Case home to our-selves; and see, in the ordinary Circumstances of Life, how Love, Ambition, and the gayer Tribe of Fancys (as well as the gloomy and dark Specters of another sort) prevail over our Mind, 'Tis easy to observe how they work on us, when we refuse to be...

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"For Nature will not be mock'd. The Prepossession against her can never be very lasting. Her Decrees and Instincts are powerful. She has a strong Party abroad; and as strong a one within our-selves."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1711, 1714

"All is revolution in us."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1717

"But, they who have considered with care the foundation and circumstances of their actions, doubt of their freedom, and are even persuaded, that their reason and understanding are slaves that cannot resist the force which carries them along."

— Collins, Anthony (1676-1729)

Date: 1726

"The Year, yet pleasing, but declining fast, / Soft, o'er the secret Soul, in gentle Gales, / A Philosophic Melancholly breathes, / And bears the swelling Thought aloft to Heaven."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)