"And every Moralist will find / A ruling passion in the mind: / Which, tho' pent up and barricado'd / Like winds, where Æolus bravado'd; / Like them, will sally from their den, / And raise a tempest now and then; / Unhinge dame Prudence from her plan, / And ruffle all the world of man."

— Lloyd, Robert (bap. 1733, d. 1764)


Date
September 1762; 1774
Metaphor
"And every Moralist will find / A ruling passion in the mind: / Which, tho' pent up and barricado'd / Like winds, where Æolus bravado'd; / Like them, will sally from their den, / And raise a tempest now and then; / Unhinge dame Prudence from her plan, / And ruffle all the world of man."
Metaphor in Context
Some vices must to all appear
As constitutional as Fear;
And every Moralist will find
A ruling passion in the mind:
Which, tho' pent up and barricado'd
Like winds, where Æolus bravado'd;
Like them, will sally from their den,
And raise a tempest now and then;
Unhinge dame Prudence from her plan,
And ruffle all the world of man.

Provenance
Searching "ruling passion" in HDIS (Restoration and C18)
Citation
At least 3 entries in ECCO and ESTC (1762, 1774, 1785).

Published in of The St. James's Magazine. By Robert Lloyd, A.M. (September 1762): 9-19. <Link to ECCO>

Text from The Poetical Works of Robert Lloyd, 2 vols. (London: Printed for T. Evans, 1774). <Link to ESTC>

See also the The Oriental Magazine (April, 1785), I, 84. <Link to ECCO>
Theme
Ruling Passion, Little World of Man
Date of Entry
05/24/2004

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.