Date: 1748

"Yet were the jarring passions tuned, / The soil from thorns and thistles clear, / Some latent virtue might appear."

— Leapor, Mary (1722-1746)

Date: 1748, 1777

"The passion for philosophy, like that for religion, seems liable to this inconvenience, that, though it aims at the correction of our manners, and extirpation of our vices, it may only serve, by imprudent management, to foster a predominant inclination, and push the mind, with more determined re...

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: 1748

"This was the true, the sole, the genuine Way of proceeding; for while carnal Desires, and such an over-weening Passion for Riches remained, their Breasts were barren Grounds, and thereby most unfit to receive the Seed of Divine Truths."

— Anonymous; [Lyttleton]

Date: 1748

"Consequently, whenever a Man attempts to subdue his Passions, and to put them under the regular Government of their natural sovereign Reason, the irrational Part must submit to the rational, the Brute must yield to the Man, and the Soul in the Event gain the Superiority over every Passion or App...

— Anonymous

Date: 1748

"But more he search'd the mind, and roused from sleep / Those moral seeds whence we heroic actions reap."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1748

"It is most true that the root of religion lies in the heart, in the inmost soul; [...] but if this root be really in the heart it cannot put forth branches"

— Wesley, John (1703-1791)

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: 1748, 1749

"But if the brain be at the same time well framed and instructed, it is a fruitful and well sown soil, that produces a hundred fold to what it received."

— Julien Offray de La Mettrie (1709-1751)

Date: 1746, 1749

"But, since we never from the Breast of Fools / Can root their Passions, yet while Reason rules, / Let her hold forth her Scales with equal Hand, / Justly to punish, as the Crimes demand."

— Francis, Philip (1708-1773)

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)