Date: 1744

"If not all-adamant, Lorenzo! hear: / All is delusion; Nature is wrapp'd up, / In tenfold night, from Reason's keenest eye; / There's no consistence, meaning, plan, or end / In all beneath the sun, in all above, / (As far as man can penetrate,) or heaven / Is an immense, inestimable prize; / Or a...

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)

Date: 1744

"And what is Reason? Be she thus defined: / Reason is upright stature in the soul."

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)

Date: 1744

"What wretched repetition cloys us here! / What periodic potions for the sick, / Distemper'd bodies, and distemper'd minds!"

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Yet more: her honours where nor beauty claims, / Nor shews of good the thirsty sense allure, / From passion's power alone our nature holds / Essential pleasure."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"But if to ampler prospects, if to gaze / On nature's form, where, negligent of all / These lesser graces, she assumes the port / Of that eternal majesty that weigh'd / The world's foundations, if to these the mind / Exalts her daring eye; then mightier far / Will be the change, and nobler."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Then the inexpressive strain / Diffuses its inchantment: fancy dreams / Of sacred fountains and Elysian groves, / And vales of bliss: the intellectual power / Bends from his awful throne a wondering ear, / And smiles: the passions, gently sooth'd away, / Sink to divine repose, and love and joy /...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Else wherefore burns / In mortal bosoms this unquenched hope, / That breathes from day to day sublimer things, / And mocks possession?"

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"But beyond / This energy of truth, whose dictates bind / Assenting reason, the benignant sire, / To deck the honour'd paths of just and good, / Has added bright imagination's rays."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"For man loves knowledge, and the beams of truth / More welcome touch his understanding's eye, / Than all the blandishments of sound his ear, / Than all of taste his tongue."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Of good and evil much, / And much of mortal man my thought revolv'd; / When starting full on fancy's gushing eye / The mournful image of Parthenia's fate, / That hour, o long belov'd and long deplor'd."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)