Date: 1755
"Then shall my cruel Foe, abash'd, recede, / Finding his artful Snares are vainly spread. / Of rolling Years, eleven are past in Pain, / Since I was doom'd to wear the galling Chain: / The Chain which am'rous Minds are forc'd to bear, / Still to the most Submissive, most severe."
preview | full record— Masters, Mary (1694-1771)
Date: 1762
"Ne’er did thy Voice assume a Master’s Pow’r, / Nor force Assent to what thy Precepts taught; / But bid my independent Spirit soar, / In all the Freedom of unfett’red Thought"
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1766
"Till now detain'd / In cruel bonds, his thoughts alone were free, / And these have never stray'd from his Constantia."
preview | full record— Williams, Anna (1708-1783)
Date: 1773
"But soon, alas! this holy calm is broke; / My soul submits to wear her wonted yoke; / With shackled pinions strives to soar in vain, / And mingles with the dross of earth again."
preview | full record— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)
Date: 1773
"Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies, / Till some lov'd objects strikes her wand'ring eyes, / Whose silken fetters all the senses bind, / And soft captivity involves the mind."
preview | full record— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)
Date: w. c. 1751, 1775
"With darts and flames some arm his [Love's] feeble hands, / His infant brow with regal honours crown; / Whilst vanquished Reason, bound with silken bands, / Meanly submissive, falls below his throne."
preview | full record— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)
Date: w. 1763, 1776
"By mercy prompted his correcting hand / Inflicts the stroke of salutary pain, / To check tyrannic Passions's wild demand, / And free our Reason from it's slavish chain."
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1780
"Shall vanity enslave this freeborn mind, / And chains of sense my nobler passions bind?"
preview | full record— Steele, Anne (1717-1778)
Date: 1780
"In vain my fetter'd thoughts attempt to fly / And weakly fluttering mean the distant sky!"
preview | full record— Steele, Anne (1717-1778)
Date: 1784
"Had I the dread necessity explained, / That with resistless force my freedom chained; / Tore the sweet bands, by virtuous passion tied, / And stampt our constancy with parricide."
preview | full record— Seward, Anna (1742-1809)