Date: w. 1365, trans. 1579

"And euerie one hath continuall warre with him selfe in the most secret closet of his minde."

— Petrarch (1304-1374); Twyne, Thomas (1543–1613)

Date: w. c. 61-63?, trans. 1611

Christ may dwell in one's heart by faith

— Paul of Tarsus (b.c. 10, d.c. 67)

Date: 1661

"[T]hrough ev'ry Breast [Faith] goes, invades their Minds, which, all-possest / By her great Deitie, each Soul doth prove / Her Altar, burning by her Sacred Love"

— Ross, Thomas (bap. 1620, d. 1675)

Date: 1675

"Nature is too liberal to deny us our Desires: She is too Noble to refuse us a gift which she preserves for us in the Cabinet of our Soul: and her Guide is too faithful to carry us astray from that good to which we aspire."

— Le Grand, Antoine (1629-1699)

Date: 1682

"The Body is but the Prison, or the Clog of the Mind; subjected to Punishments, Robberies, Diseases; but the Mind is Sacred, and Spiritual, and Liable to no Violence."

— L'Estrange, Sir Roger (1616-1704)

Date: 1686, 1712

"But while confin'd to this dark Cell I lie, / My captive Soul can't reach its native Sky"

— Arwaker, Edmund (c.1655-1730)

Date: 1686, 1712

"When first my Soul put on its fleshly Load, / It was Imprison'd in the dark Abode; / My Feet were Fetters, my Hands Manacles, / My Sinews Chains, and all Confinement else; / My Bones the Bars of my loath'd Prison grate; / My Tongue the Turn-key, and my Mouth the Gate."

— Arwaker, Edmund (c.1655-1730)

Date: 1694, 1778

"But he said, that Vulcan was the most imprudent of them all, because he did not make a Window in the Man's Breast, that he might see what his Thoughts were, whether he designed some Trick, or whether he intended what he spoke."

— Pomey, François (1618-1673)

Date: 1700, 1717

"Thus all Things are but alter'd, nothing dies; / And here and there th' unbodied Spirit flies, / By Time, or Force, or Sickness dispossess, / And lodges, where it lights, in Man or Beast; / Or hunts without, till ready Limbs it find, / And actuates those according to their kind; / From Tenement ...

— Dryden, John (1631-1700)

Date: 1700, 1717

"This Helenus to great AEneas told, / Which I retain, e'er since in other Mould: / My Soul was cloath'd; and now rejoice to view / My Country Walls rebuilt, and Troy reviv'd anew, / Rais'd by the fall: Decreed by Loss to Gain; / Enslav'd but to be free, and conquer'd but to reign."

— Dryden, John (1631-1700)