Date: 1751, 1777

"I suppose, if Cicero were now alive, it would be found difficult to fetter his moral sentiments by narrow systems; or persuade him, that no qualities were to be admitted as virtues, or acknowledged to be a part of personal merit, but what were recommended by The Whole Duty of Man."

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: 1751

"Thus a lively Imagination and unperceived Self-Love, fetter the Heart in certain ideal Bonds of their own creating: Till at length some turbulent and furious Passion arising in its Strength, breaks these fantastic Shackles which Fancy had imposed, and leaps to its Prey like a Tyger chained by Co...

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: Saturday, April 6, 1751

"Austerities and mortifications are means by which the mind is invigorated and roused, by which the attractions of pleasure are interrupted, and the chains of sensuality are broken."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Saturday, April 13, 1751

"It is therefore not less necessary to happiness than to virtue, that he rid his mind of passions which make him uneasy to himself, and hateful to the world, which enchain his intellects, and obstruct his improvement."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, February 25, 1752

"They whose souls are so chained down to coffers and tenements, that they cannot conceive a state in which they shall look upon them with less solicitude, are seldom attentive or flexible to arguments; but the votaries of fame are capable of reflection, and therefore may be called to reconsider t...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1754

"What is the juxta-position of ideas? what is that chain which connects, by intermediate ideas that are the links of it, ideas that are remote, but figurative stile?"

— St John, Henry, styled first Viscount Bolingbroke (1678-1751)

Date: 1755

"When the mind is unchained from necessity, it will range after convenience; when it is left at large in the fields of speculation, it will shift opinions; as any custom is disused, the words that expressed it must perish with it; as any opinion grows popular, it will innovate speech in the same ...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: December 29, 1759

"But as we advance forward into the crowds of life, innumerable delights sollicit our inclinations, and innumerable cares distract our attention; the time of youth is passed in noisy frolicks; manhood is led on from hope to hope, and from project to project; the dissoluteness of pleasure, the ine...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1762

"For a perfect Knowledge in these, and a proper Attention to Emphasis, will not only lead to, but, at last, actually produce what includes them all, such a masterly Elocution, as can hold the Passions captive, and surprize the Soul itself in its inmost Recesses."

— Buchanan, James (fl. 1753-1773)

Date: 1762

"Ils sont sourds, en effet, à la voix intérieure qui leur crie d’un ton difficile à méconnaître: Une machine ne pense point, il n’y a ni mouvement, ni figure qui produise la réflexion: quelque chose en toi cherche à briser les liens qui le compriment; l’espace n’est pas ta mesure, l’univers entie...

— Rousseau, Jean-Jacques (1712-1778)