Date: 1740
"In vain we forge coercive Chains, to bind / The strongest, noblest Passion of the Mind."
preview | full record— Duck, Stephen (1705-1756)
Date: 1742
"By Him instructed, even the meanest Prince / Shall rise to envy'd Greatness, shall advance / His dreaded Pow'r above Restraint and Fear, / And all the Rules, that in fantastick Chains / Inferior Minds confine."
preview | full record— West, Gilbert (1703-1756)
Date: 1747
"SINCE freed from Love's enchanting Pains, / Your Heart no longer wears my Chains"
preview | full record— Lennox, née Ramsay, (Barbara) Charlotte (1730/1?-1804)
Date: 1751
"And fettering on her Throne th' immortal Mind, / The Guidance of her Realm to Passions wild resign'd."
preview | full record— West, Gilbert (1703-1756)
Date: 1755
"Then shall my cruel Foe, abash'd, recede, / Finding his artful Snares are vainly spread. / Of rolling Years, eleven are past in Pain, / Since I was doom'd to wear the galling Chain: / The Chain which am'rous Minds are forc'd to bear, / Still to the most Submissive, most severe."
preview | full record— Masters, Mary (1694-1771)
Date: 1760?
The Grace teaches "On the Subject when to be / Grave or gay, reserv'd or free: / The speaking Air, th' impassion'd Eye, / The living Soul of Symmetry; / And that soft Sympathy that binds / In magic Chains congenial Minds."
preview | full record— Langhorne, John (1735-1779)
Date: 1762
"Ne’er did thy Voice assume a Master’s Pow’r, / Nor force Assent to what thy Precepts taught; / But bid my independent Spirit soar, / In all the Freedom of unfett’red Thought"
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1763
"Doth Virtue in thy bosom brighter glow, / Or from a Spring more pure doth Action flow? / Is not thy Soul bound with those very chains / Which shackle us, or is that SELF, which reigns / O'er Kings and Beggars, which in all we see / Most strong and sov'reign, only weak in Thee?"
preview | full record— Churchill, Charles (1731-1764)
Date: 1766
Earthly pleasures are "Not meant by heav'n to perish unenjoy'd, / Or pass'd with scorn by superstitious pride; / Nor, grov'ling here, the brutal soul to chain, / Where happiness is still alloy'd with pain; / But there the soaring intellect to fix, / Where pain or sorrow ne'er with transport mix."
preview | full record— Woodhouse, James (bap. 1735, d. 1820)
Date: 1767
"Yet, to the stoic apathy estrang'd, / Thou canst, with steady courage, probe to th' quick / The wound thou mean'st to cure; thou canst reprove / With all the sweet persuasion of esteem: / And give a momentary pang, to free / The worthy mind from its ignoble chain."
preview | full record— Dodd, William (1729-1777)