Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Or flows their semblance from that mystic tone / To which the new-born mind's harmonious powers / At first were strung?"

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Nor thence partakes / Fresh pleasure only: for the attentive mind, / By this harmonious action on her powers / Becomes herself harmonious: wont so oft / In outward things to meditate the charm / Of sacred order, soon she seeks at home / To find a kindred order, to exert / Within herself this ele...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Whence is this effect, / This kindred power of such discordant things? /Or flows their semblance from that mystic tone / To which the new-born mind's harmonious powers / At first were strung? Or rather from the links / Which artful custom twines around her frame?"

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"For as old Memnon's image, long renown'd / By fabling Nilus, to the quivering touch / Of Titan's ray, with each repulsive string / Consenting, sounded through the warbling air / Unbidden strains; even so did nature's hand / To certain species of external things, / Attune the finer organs of the ...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"So the glad impulse of congenial powers, / Or of sweet sound, or fair proportion'd form, / The grace of motion, or the bloom of light, / Thrills through imagination's tender frame, / From nerve to nerve: all naked and alive / They catch the spreading rays: till now the soul / At length discloses...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"Thou, smiling queen of every tuneful breast, / Indulgent Fancy from the fruitful banks / Of Avon, whence thy rosy fingers cull / Fresh flowers and dews to sprinkle on the turf / Where Shakespeare lies, be present."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1773

"Smooth like her verse her passions learned to move, / And her whole soul was harmony and love."

— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)

Date: 1790

"His mind resembled a finetoned instrument, whose extensive compass was capable of producing the most sublime and elevating sounds; but a fatal pressure relaxed the strings, and sunk its powerful harmony."

— Williams, Helen Maria (1759-1827)