Date: 1762
"Ne’er did thy Voice assume a Master’s Pow’r, / Nor force Assent to what thy Precepts taught; / But bid my independent Spirit soar, / In all the Freedom of unfett’red Thought"
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1773
"But soon, alas! this holy calm is broke; / My soul submits to wear her wonted yoke; / With shackled pinions strives to soar in vain, / And mingles with the dross of earth again."
preview | full record— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)
Date: 1773
"Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies, / Till some lov'd objects strikes her wand'ring eyes, / Whose silken fetters all the senses bind, / And soft captivity involves the mind."
preview | full record— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)
Date: w. 1763, 1776
"By mercy prompted his correcting hand / Inflicts the stroke of salutary pain, / To check tyrannic Passions's wild demand, / And free our Reason from it's slavish chain."
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1788
"See the fond links of feeling nature broke! / The fibres twisting round a parent's heart, / Torn from their grasp, and bleeding as they part."
preview | full record— More, Hannah (1745-1833)
Date: 1788
"When the sharp iron wounds his inmost soul, / And his strain'd eyes in burning anguish roll; / Will the parch'd negro find, ere he expire, / No pain in hunger, and no heat in fire?"
preview | full record— More, Hannah (1745-1833)
Date: 1788
"On Eloquence, prevailing art! / Whose force can chain the list'ning heart; / The throb of Sympathy inspire, / And kindle every great desire; / With magic energy controul / And reign the sov'reign of the soul!"
preview | full record— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)
Date: 1793
"For what is sleep, but temporary death; / Sealing up all the windows of the soul, / And binding ev'ry thought in torpid chains?"
preview | full record— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)
Date: 1793
"But, most of all, [the mind is subject] to that lov'd voice, whose thrill, / Rushing impetuous through each throbbing vein, / Dilates the wond'ring mind, and frees its pow'rs / From the cold chains of icy apathy / To all the vast extremes of bliss and pain!"
preview | full record— Robinson [Née Darby], Mary [Perdita] (1758-1800)
Date: 1794
"Each man of sense, you'll find disdain / To drag coquetry's galling chain. / 'Tis prudence, truth, good sense, my dear, / That makes the lamp of love burn clear; / These are the silken cords, that bind / The Lover's, and the Husband's mind."
preview | full record— Pointon, Priscilla [AKA Priscilla Pickering] (c. 1740-1801)