Date: Wednesday, April 30, 1712
"Oh! Love has Fetters stronger far: / By Bolts of Steel are Limbs confined, / But cruel Love enchains the Mind."
preview | full record— Philips, Ambrose (1674-1749)
Date: March 30, 1716
"As it is a laudable freedom of thought which unshackles their minds from the poor and narrow prejudices of education, and opens their eyes to a more extensive view of the publick good; the same freedom of thought disposes several of them to the embracing of particular schemes and maxims, and to ...
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: 1745
"'I am too noble, and of too high a birth,' saith that excellent moralist, 'to be a slave to my body; which I look upon only as a chain thrown upon the liberty of my soul.'"
preview | full record— Mason, John (1706-1763)
Date: Tuesday, May 22, 1750
"He saw that, instead of conquering their fears, the endeavour of his gay friends was only to escape them; but his philosophy chained his mind to its object, and rather loaded him with shackles than furnished him with arms."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Tuesday, August 28, 1750
"An habitual sadness seizes upon the soul, and the faculties are chained to a single object, which can never be contemplated but with hopeless uneasiness."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, 13 October 1750
"Those parallel circumstances, and kindred images, to which we readily conform our minds, are, above all other writings, to be found in narratives of the lives of particular persons; and therefore no species of writing seems more worthy of cultivation than biography, since none can be more deligh...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: 1751
"Thus a lively Imagination and unperceived Self-Love, fetter the Heart in certain ideal Bonds of their own creating: Till at length some turbulent and furious Passion arising in its Strength, breaks these fantastic Shackles which Fancy had imposed, and leaps to its Prey like a Tyger chained by Co...
preview | full record— Brown, John (1715-1766)
Date: Saturday, April 6, 1751
"Austerities and mortifications are means by which the mind is invigorated and roused, by which the attractions of pleasure are interrupted, and the chains of sensuality are broken."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Saturday, April 13, 1751
"It is therefore not less necessary to happiness than to virtue, that he rid his mind of passions which make him uneasy to himself, and hateful to the world, which enchain his intellects, and obstruct his improvement."
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)
Date: Tuesday, February 25, 1752
"They whose souls are so chained down to coffers and tenements, that they cannot conceive a state in which they shall look upon them with less solicitude, are seldom attentive or flexible to arguments; but the votaries of fame are capable of reflection, and therefore may be called to reconsider t...
preview | full record— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)