Date: 1785

"Thus rust the Mind's best powers."

— Yearsley, Ann (bap. 1753, d. 1806)

Date: 1787

"Love was ever the touchstone to try the fine mind, / Sterling Virtue 'twill never debase; / No alloy can we know, from a passion refin'd,"

— Yearsley, Ann (bap. 1753, d. 1806)

Date: 1787

"Virtue sleeps / While all the finest faculties of mind / Rust, like the iron long unus'd"

— Yearsley, Ann (bap. 1753, d. 1806)

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?"

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1788

"Not so the slave; oppress'd with secret care, / He sinks the hapless victim of despair; / Or, doom'd to torments that might even move / The steely heart, and melt it into love; / Till worn with anguish, with'ring in his bloom, / He falls an early tenant of the tomb!"

— Falconar, Maria (b. 1771-) and Harriet (b. 1774-)

Date: 1788

"For Virtue, with divine controul, / Collects the various powers of soul; / And lends, from her unsullied source, / The gems of thought their purest force."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1788

"True courage in the unconquer'd soul / Yields to Compassion's mild controul; / As, the resisting frame of steel / The magnet's secret force can feel."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)

Date: 1788

"Or, if where savage habit steels / The vulgar mind, one bosom feels / The sacred claim of helpless woe-- / If Pity in that soil can grow; / Pity! whose tender impulse darts / With keenest force on nobler hearts; / As flames that purest essence boast, / Rise highest when they tremble most."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)