Date: 1667

"We stifle our own Sun, and live in Shade; / But where its beams do once appear, / They make that person of himself afraid, / And to his own acts most severe."

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1686

"Change did I say, that word I must forbear, / No, she bright Star wont wander from her sphere / Of Virtue (in which Female Souls do move) / Nor will she joyn with an insatiate love."

— Egerton [née Fyge; other married name Field], Sarah (1670-1723)

Date: 1688

"I will be deaf and blind, and guard my Heart with Walls of Ice, and make you know, that when the Flames of true Devotion are kindled in a Heart, it puts out all other Fires; which are as ineffectual, as Candles lighted in the Face of the Sun."

— Behn, Aphra (1640?-1689)

Date: 1700

"Affliction, the sincerest Friend, the frankest Monitor, the best Instructer and indeed the only useful School that Women are ever put to, rouses her understanding, opens her Eyes, fixes her Attention, and diffuses such a Light, such a Joy into her Mind, as not only Informs her better, but Entert...

— Astell, Mary (1666–1731)

Date: 1700

"She will discern a time when her Sex shall be no bar to the best Employments, the highest Honor; a time when that distinction, now so much us'd to her Prejudice, shall be no more, but provided she is not wanting to her self, her Soul shall shine as bright as the greatest Heroe's."

— Astell, Mary (1666–1731)

Date: 1702

It is "most consonant to Reason to think this [LIfe] is only a State of Probation, and that the dispensation of Rewards and Punishments, is reserv'd for a Future Life; there being no other way to reconcile the partial distribution of things here, to that order which we know is agreeable to the Di...

— Trotter, Catherine, later Cockburn, (1674?-1749)

Date: 1703

Souls are "Like Tapers hid in Urns they shine. / The Life of Sense and Growth we only see, / Which Beasts enjoy as well as we."

— Chudleigh [née Lee], Mary, Lady Chudleigh (bap. 1656, d. 1710)

Date: 1712, 1715, 1719

"Valerius now became an Example; for he was not wicked in his Nature, but misled by the Ignis-fatuus of his Passion and Interest."

— Barker, Jane (1675-1743)

Date: 1723, 1725

"AS Tapers languish at th' Approach of Day," and as the "Book of Fame" may be "Eraz'd and blotted," "So fully o'er the Soul may a lover's Influence reign, "That not one Rebel-Thought [its] Sway disdains"

— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)

Date: 1724, 1725

One may be "puzzled with a too great Variety" and "have their Judgments dimm'd with the Confusion of Ideas"

— Haywood [née Fowler], Eliza (1693?-1756)