Date: w. 1736, 1749

"Why should I drag along this life I hate, / Without one thought to mitigate the weight? / Whence this mysterious bearing to exist, / When every joy is lost, and every hope dismissed? / In chains and darkness wherefore should I stay, / And mourn in prison, while I keep the key?"

— Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley [née Lady Mary Pierrepont] (1689-1762)

Date: 1749

"I do not doubt but your Obedience to me will make you at least put on the Appearance of Chearfulness in my Sight: But you will deceive yourself, if you think that is performing your Duty; for if you would obey me as you ought, you must try heartily to root from your Mind all Sorrow and Gloominess."

— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)

Date: 1749

"Her tender Heart was at that Instant overflowing in soft Tears, caused by a kind Participation of their present Transport, yet mixed with the deep sad Impression of a Grief her Bosom was full fraught with."

— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)

Date: 1749

"Chloe, in this time, by proper Reflections, and a due Sense of Caelia's great Goodness and Affection to her, had so entirely got the better of herself in this Affair, that she found she could now, without any Uneasiness see them married; and calling Caelia to her, she said with a Smile, 'I have,...

— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)

Date: 1750

A heart may be "as true as the sun"

— Jemmat [née Yeo], Catherine (bap. 1714, d. 1766?)

Date: November 10, 1750

"Is it possible that experience should produce error, and that the exemption of old people from the passions of youth, should be no better a privilege than to leave room for the love of money, which seems then to engross the whole soul, and to fill up the place of all the other passions!"

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: November 10, 1750

"Does the soul (one would be almost tempted to ask) contract and shrivel up with old age, like the body?"

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: November 10, 1750

"Is it that a long commerce with the world does indeed corrupt the heart; and extinguish by degrees those sparks of light, those inclinations to good, which were implanted in our minds?"

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: November 10, 1750

"Or is it rather to be attributed to the seeds of original evil, which grow with our years, and overspread the whole soul?"

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: 1751

"But could our Eyes behold the deep Recess, / Where soft Pamela's Thoughts in private rest, / You'd find, in spite of Hymen's sacred Vows, / Ten Hours in Twelve that she abhors her Spouse"

— Leapor, Mary (1722-1746)