Date: 1724

"[S]o with my Eyes open, and with my Conscience, as I may say, awake, I sinn'd, knowing it to be a Sin, but having no Power to resist; when this had thus made a Hole in my Heart, and I was come to such a height, as to transgress against the Light of my own Conscience, I was then fit for any Wicke...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1736

"Dreams were the only Work of a disturb'd Fancy, and were as far from Truth, as the Glow-Worm's dim Shine from Light and Heat; the Creatures of the drowsy Brain."

— Chetwood, William Rufus (d. 1766)

Date: 1741 [1740]; continued in 1741

"But my Weakness of Body made me move so slowly, that it gave Time for a little Reflection, a Ray of Grace, to dart in upon my benighted Mind; and so, when I came to the Pond-side, I sat myself down on the sloping Bank, and began to ponder my wretched Condition: And thus I reason'd with myself."

— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)

Date: 1741 [1740]; continued in 1741

A mother may "watch the beamy Dawnings of Reason" in her child and direct his or her "little Passions, as they shew themselves, to this or that particular Point of Benefit and Use"

— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)