Date: 1712
Lucretius and Epicurus are asked, "How to the Mind a Thought reflected goes, / And how the conscious Engine knows it Knows."
preview | full record— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)
Date: 1712
"Tell us, Lucretius, Epicurus, tell, / And you in Wit unrival'd shall excel, / How thro' the outward Sense the Object flies, / How in the Soul her Images arise. / What Thinking, what Perception is, explain; / What all the airy Creatures of the Brain; / How to the Mind a Thought reflected goes, / ...
preview | full record— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)
Date: 1714
"Have you examin'd / Into your inmost Heart, and try'd at leisure / The several secret Springs that move the Passions? / Has Mercy fix'd her Empire there so sure, / That Wrath and Vengeance never may return?"
preview | full record— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)
Date: 1723
"Can'st say what diff'rent Turns the Spirits take, / When they of diff'rent Kinds Impressions make; / What vital Springs those Spirits in their Flight / Strike to cause Torment, what to give Delight."
preview | full record— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)
Date: w. 1741
"While breath shall animate this frail machine, / My heart sincere, which never flatt'ry knew, / Shall consecrate its warmest wish to you."
preview | full record— Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley [née Lady Mary Pierrepont] (1689-1762)
Date: 1777
"I'd hangings weave, in fancy's loom / For Lady Norton's dressing room."
preview | full record— Mason, William (1725-1797)
Date: December 10, 1776; 1777
"To understand literally these metaphors or ideas expressed in poetical language, seems to be equally absurd as to conclude, that because painters sometimes represent poets writing from the dictates of a little winged boy or genius, that this same genius did really inform him in a whisper what he...
preview | full record— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)
Date: 1782
All "ideas follow each other in our minds in a regular and uniform succession, not unlike the tickings of a clock; and by that means all objects are presented to our imaginations in the same progressive manner: and if any vary much from that destined pace, by too rapid, or too slow a motion, they...
preview | full record— Jenyns, Soame (1704-1787)
Date: 1785
"I tread his deck, / Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes / Discover countries, with a kindred heart / Suffer his woes and share in his escapes, / While fancy, like the finger of a clock, / Runs the great circuit, and is still at home."
preview | full record— Cowper, William (1731-1800)
Date: 1786
"Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock, / Machines themselves, and govern'd by a clock."
preview | full record— Cowper, William (1731-1800)