Date: 1731

"Lastly, from hence is that strange Parturiency that is often observed in the Mind, when it is sollicitously set upon the Investigation of some Truth, whereby it doth endeavour, by ruminating and revolving within it self as it were to conceive it within itself, to bring it forth out of its own Wo...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

Date: 1734

"And if it be said that the Understanding, which is but passive it self, like the bodily Eye, cannot be called the Leader of the rest of the Faculties; it must be granted, that (strictly speaking) it is rather the Light than the Guide: for if we consider it in the three Operations mention'd by th...

— Forbes of Pitsligo, Alexander Forbes, Lord (1678-1762)

Date: 1736

"Awake, great Common Sense, and sleep no more, / Look to thy self; for then, when I was slain, / Thy self was struck at."

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: January 1739

"The mind is a kind of theatre, where several perceptions successively make their appearance; pass, repass, glide away, and mingle in an infinite variety of postures and situations."

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: January 1739

"Since the imagination, therefore, in running from low to high, finds an opposition in its internal qualities and principles, and since the soul, when elevated with joy and courage, in a manner seeks opposition, and throws itself with alacrity into any scene of thought or action where its courage...

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: 1743

"Mistaken kindness! our hearts heal too soon. / Are they more kind than He who struck the blow, / Who bid it do His errand in our hearts, / And banish peace, till nobler guests arrive, / And bring it back a true and endless peace?"

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)

Date: 1743

"Is this the cause Death flies all human thought? / Or is it Judgment by the Will struck blind, / (That domineering mistress of the soul,) / Like him so strong, by Delilah the fair?"

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)

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: 1746

One's sires's "great soul" may respire in one's breast

— Ruffhead, James

Date: 1747-8

"If in look, if in speech, a girl waves way to undue levity, depend upon it, the devil has got one of his cloven feet in her heart already."

— Richardson, Samuel (bap. 1689, d. 1761)