Date: w. 1592-3 or 1595?, 1623

"O, Warwick, I do bend my knee with thine, / And in this vow do chain my soul to thine."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: August, 1674; 1675

"How! Is your Soul once more enter'd into that Bondage?"

— Crowne, John (bap. 1641, d. 1712)

Date: 1678

"But Fancy, I think, in Poetry, is like Faith in Religion; it makes far discoveries, and soars above reason, but never clashes, or runs against it. Fancy leaps, and frisks, and away she's gone; whilst reason rattles the chains, and follows after."

— Rymer, Thomas (1641-1713)

Date: 1703

"Force, and the Wills of our Imperious Rulers, / May bind two Bodies in one wretched Chain; / But Minds will still look back to their own Choice. / So the poor Captive in a Foreign Realm, / Stands on the Shoar, and sends his Wishes back / To the dear Native Land from whence he came."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: November 25, 1707; 1708

"In Honour's Name remember what you are, / Break from the Bondage of this feeble Passion, / And urge your way to Glory."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: November 25, 1707; 1708

"I feel my Soul impatient of its Bondage, / Disdaining this unworthy, idle Passion, / And strugling to be free."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1714

"Well then, I own my Heart has broke your Chains. / Patient I bore the painful Bondage long, / At length my generous Love disdains your Tyranny."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1753

"He combats Passion, rooted in the Soul, / Whose Powers at once delight ye and controul; / Whose Magic Bondage each lost Slave enjoys, / Nor wishes Freedom, tho' the Spell destroys."

— Moore, Edward (1712-1757)

Date: 1792

"Curs'd lethargy of the soul! ... that chain'd my better judgement, cramp'd all my strength of mind--ruin'd all my prospects."

— Tytler, Alexander Fraser (1747-1813); Schiller (1759-1805)

Date: 1792

"I should be a pitiful bungler indeed, if I knew not yet how to tear a son from the heart of his father, were they link'd together with chains of iron."

— Tytler, Alexander Fraser (1747-1813); Schiller (1759-1805)