Date: 1654

"But where that cannot be had, it is fit that Justice and Charity should so far overrule mens actions, that every man may not be carryed in matter of contract, by the sway of his owne unreasonable will, and be free to carve for himselfe as he lists of the buyers purse: every man hath a bird in hi...

— Hall, Joseph (1574-1656)

Date: 1654

"[T]here are cases wherein this law must vaile to an higher, which is the law of Conscience: Woe be to that man who shall tye himselfe so close to the letter of the law, as to make shipwrack of conscience; And that bird in his bosome will tell him, that if upon what ever pretences, he shall willi...

— Hall, Joseph (1574-1656)

Date: 1657

The fancy is a "Boundlesse, restlesse faculty, free from all engagements, diggs without spade, sails without Ships, Flies without wings, builds without charges, fights without bloodshed, in a moment striding from the Center to the circumference of the world, by a kind of omnipotency creating and ...

— Poole, Joshua (c.1615–c.1656)

Date: 1660, 1676

"For a scrupulous conscience does not take away the proper determination of the understanding; but it is like a Woman handling of a Frog or a Chicken, which, all their friends tell them, can do them no hurt, and they are convinced in reason that they cannot, they believe it and know it ;...

— Taylor, Jeremy (bap. 1613, 1667)

Date: 1666

"The composition of all poems is or ought to be of wit, and wit in the poet, or wit writing (if you will give me leave to use a school distinction), is no other than the faculty of imagination in the writer, which, like a nimble spaniel, beats over and ranges through the field of memory, till it ...

— Dryden, John (1631-1700)

Date: 1678

"A Weak mind complains before it is overtaken with evil, and as Birds are affrighted with the noise of the Sling, so the infirm soul anticipates its troubles by its own fearful apprehensions, and falls under them before they are yet arrived."

— Wanley, Nathaniel (1634-1680)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

The Understanding's "searches after Truth, are a sort of Hawking and Hunting, wherein the very pursuit makes a great part of the Pleasure"

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"How far such an one [one in whom "decrepid old Age" has blotted out Memory] (notwithstanding all that is boasted of innate Principles) is in his Knowledge, and intellectual Faculties, above the Condition of a Cockle, or an Oyster, I leave to be considered."

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"The ignorance and darkness that is in us, no more hinders nor confines the knowledge that is in others, than the blindness of a mole is an argument against the quicksightedness of an eagle"

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1694, 1704

"If we govern ourselves in the use of sensual delight, by the Laws of God and reason, we shall find ourselves more at ease than if we should let loose the reins to our appetites and lusts."

— Tillotson, John (1630–1694)