Date: 1691

"It is usual enough for Persons, who are disturbed by two such violent passions, to change their Resolutions and Sentiments, accordingly as one of those two becomes the stronger. Elizabeth's heart did long since experience that vicissitude, and it being equally divided, between the love of her Au...

— Anonymous

Date: 1691

"Lastly, [sin] grows into a strong Man, and doth of it self run up and down our Little World, invade all the Faculties of Soul and Body, which are at last made the Instruments of Satan to act and fulfill it."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"Instead of those sage and grave Notions that used to fill my Head, 'twas cramm'd top full of Whimseys and Whirligigs, by the vehement agitation of my distemper'd Fancy, as ever a Carkase-shell with Instruments of Death and Murder."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1696

"Is your heart made of that impenetrable Mould, that Sighs and Prayers are vain Batteries; or doth some hidden happy Youth rob me of my desir'd Prize? She blusht at that, and he observ'd it."

— Pix, Mary (c.1666-1720)

Date: 1723

"Neither cou'd our Spy, considering his Education in the Mahometan Religion, take a properer Method, in my Opinion, to disengage himself from the Legends of the Nursery, and Fables of the Schools, (as a great man calls our Infant Idea's of things) than to follow the Counsel of his beloved des Car...

— Marana, Giovanni Paolo (1642-1693); Anonymous [William Bradshaw (fl. 1700) or Robert Midgley (1655?-1723)?]

Date: 1732

"Distrest by a confused Medley of thinking, she threw herself carelesly on a Couch, where amid a Chaos of Reflection, she slept, if, we can properly be said to sleep, (when the Mind fir'd by warring Passions, dreams 'em o'er again) the Chamber Door had but negligently fell too, for the unthinking...

— Boyd, Elizabeth (fl. 1727-1745)

Date: 1741 [1740]; continued in 1741

Pamela is apt to look upon sheepishness "as an outward Fence or Inclosure, as I may say, to his Virtue, which might keep off the lighter Attacks of Immorality, the Hussars of Vice, as I may say, who are not able to carry on a formal Siege against his Morals"

— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)

Date: 1760-7

"Whether they were above my uncle Toby's reason,--or contrary to it,-- or that his brain was like wet tinder, and no spark could possibly take hold,--or that it was so full of saps, mines, blinds, curtins, and such military disqualifications to his seeing clearly into Prignitz and Scroderus's doc...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1760-7

"But the heat gradually increasing, and in a few seconds more getting beyond the point of all sober pleasure, and then advancing with all speed into the regions of pain,--the soul of Phutatorius, together with all his ideas, his thoughts, his attention, his imagination, judgment, resolution, deli...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1761

"The image of Eloisa, never to be erased from my mind, shall be my shield, and render my soul invulnerable."

— Rousseau, Jean-Jacques (1712-1778); Kenrick, William (1729/30-1779)