Date: 1754

"She put me upon recollecting the giddy scene, which those dreadfully interesting ones that followed it, had made me wish to blot out of my memory."

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

Date: 1754

"I wish this ugly word foreign were blotted out of my vocabulary; out of my memory, rather"

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

Date: 1754

"Proceed, child, your mind is the unsullied book of nature: Turn to another Leaf"

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

Date: 1754

"Sir Charles Grandison's heart is the book of heaven-- May I not study it?"

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

Date: 1759

"His Inclination for Lady Dellwyn's Beauty had not Power enough to blot out of his Memory the principal View of all his Actions"

— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)

Date: 1759

"The way to be happy is to live according to nature, in obedience to that universal and unalterable law with which every heart is originally impressed; which is not written on it by precept, but engraven by destiny, not instilled by education, but infused at our nativity."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1761

"[M]any, therefore, may violate that rule of right, which the hand of the Almighty has written upon the living tablets of the heart"

— Hawkesworth, John (bap. 1720, d. 1773)

Date: 1762

"Your constant endeavours have been to inculcate the best principles into youthful minds, the only probable means of mending mankind; for the foundation of most of our virtues, or our vices, are laid in that season of life when we are most susceptible of impression, and when our minds, as on a sh...

— Scott [née Robinson], Sarah (1720-1795)

Date: 1762

"He reverenced and respected her like a divinity, but hoped that prudence might enable him to conquer his passion, at the same time that it had not force enough to determine him to fly her presence, the only possible means of lessening the impression which every hour engraved more deeply on his h...

— Scott [née Robinson], Sarah (1720-1795)

Date: 1763

"I recollect those dear moments of confidence and friendship engraved for ever on my heart."

— Brooke [née Moore], Frances (bap. 1724, d. 1789)