Date: 1717
"Jove with a nod may bid the world to rest, / But Serenissa must becalm her breast."
preview | full record— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)
Date: 1719
"In the midst of the greatest Composures of my Mind, this would break out upon me like a Storm, and make me wring my Hands, and weep like a Child."
preview | full record— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)
Date: 1719
"I was not so much surpriz'd with the Lightning, as I was with a Thought which darted into my Mind as swift as the Lightning it self: O my Powder!"
preview | full record— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)
Date: First performed February 17, 1720.
"The Threats of Death are nothing; / Tho' thy last Message shook his Soul, as Winds / On the bleak Hills bend down some lofty Pine; / Yet still he held his Root; till I found Means, / Abating somewhat of thy first Demand, / If not to make him wholly ours, at least / To gain sufficient to our End."
preview | full record— Hughes, John (1678?-1720)
Date: First performed February 17, 1720.
"O Eudocia! / No longer now my dazled Eyes behold thee / Thro' Passion's Mists; my Soul now gazes on thee, / And sees thee lovelier in unfading Charms, / Bright as the shining Angel Host that stood!"
preview | full record— Hughes, John (1678?-1720)
Date: April 18, 1721
"Must I despair then? Do not shake me thus: / My Tempest-beaten Heart is cold to Death."
preview | full record— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)
Date: 1722
"[O]r that hence, as swiftly those imperceptible Messengers called animal Spirits, should, at the Nutus Animae, rush through their Meandrous Paths like Lightning, and having dispatched the Mandates of the Will, as speedily bring back their Errand to the common Sensory."
preview | full record— Turner, Daniel (1667-1741)
Date: 1722
"Blush rather, that you are a Slave to Passion; / Subservient to the Wildness of your Will; / Which, like a Whirlwind, tears up all your Vertues; / And gives you not the Leisure to consider."
preview | full record— Philips, Ambrose (1674-1749)
Date: 1723
"Can Lictors able in Dispute dispell / The Clouds of Errour that involve the Mind, within?"
preview | full record— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)
Date: February 22, 1723
"For 'tis th' infirmity of noblest minds, / When ruffled with an unexpected woe, / To speak what settled prudence wou'd conceal: / As the vex'd ocean working in a storm, / Oft brings to light the wrecks which long lay calm, / In the dark bosom of the secret deep."
preview | full record— Fenton, Elijah (1683-1730)