Date: 1789

"A passion like mine, makes the heart rebellious--it will love on--it will hope, in spite of the rules cold reason dictates"

— Inchbald [née Simpson], Elizabeth (1753-1821)

Date: 1793

"Tears from our sex are not always the result of grief; they are frequently no more than little sympathetic tributes which we pay to our fellow-beings, while the mind and the heart are steeled against the weakness which our eyes indicate"

— Inchbald [née Simpson], Elizabeth (1753-1821)

Date: 1793

"Can you say, your mind and heart are so steeled?"

— Inchbald [née Simpson], Elizabeth (1753-1821)

Date: 1793

"I must consider what's to be done--and in this room my thoughts are too confined to reflect."

— Inchbald [née Simpson], Elizabeth (1753-1821)

Date: 1796, 1806

"A dread coincidence of time and act / Drew me from Reason's empire to Despair!"

— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)

Date: 1796, 1806

"O! blessings on thee!--soft, this ray of hope / Dazzles my aching senses, and I start / As from a dream of horror, where the brain, / Stampt with the semblance of some phantom dire / Reflects it, waking, to the fearful gaze!"

— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)

Date: 1796, 1806

"Ambition!--not that emulative zeal Which wings the tow'ring souls of godlike men! / But bold, oppressive, self-created pow'r, / That, trampling o'er the barrier of the laws, / And scattering wide the tender shoots of pity, / Strikes at the root of reason, and confines / Nature itself in bondage!"

— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)