Date: 1752, 1791

"The brain's an useless organ grown, / And Reason tumbled from his throne."

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"This home philosophy, you know, / Was priz'd some thousand years ago. / Then why abroad a frequent guest? / Why such a stranger to your breast?"

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"Not all the volumes on thy shelf, / Are worth that single volume, Self."

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"Know too, the joys of sense controul, / And clog the motions of the soul; / Forbid her pinions to aspire, / Damp and impair her native fire: / And sure as Sense (that tyrant!) reigns, / She holds the empress, Soul, in chains."

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"Inglorious bondage to the mind, / Heaven-born, sublime, and unconfin'd!"

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"When Fancy's airy horse I strode, / And join'd the army on the road."

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1752, 1791

"Life's records rise on ev'ry side, / And Conscience spreads those volumes wide; / Which faithful registers were brought / By pale-ey'd Fear and busy Thought. / Those faults which artful men conceal, / Stand here engrav'd with pen of steel, / By Conscience, that impartial scribe!"

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)