Date: 1696

"I find the danger now: my Spirits start / At the alarm, and from all quarters come / To Man my Heart, the Citadel of love."

— Southerne, Thomas (1659-1746)

Date: 1700

"I cannot view you, Madam: For when you speak, all the Faculties of my charm'd Soul crowd to my attentive Ears; desert my Eyes, which gaze insensibly"

— Farquhar, George (1676/7-1707)

Date: 1726

"I have so many Thoughts crowding in upon me, I don't know which first to speak to."

— Southerne, Thomas (1659-1746)

Date: 1726

"Come quickly to the rescue of my Love, / Transport me with the dear, dear Sight of you, / Far from the crowding Thoughts of what I owe / To Warcourt, for my Father, and my self:"

— Southerne, Thomas (1659-1746)

Date: 1739

"The Sense but to have sav'd that wond'rous Man, / Is still a smiling Cherub in my Breast, / And whispers Peace within."

— Brooke, Henry (c. 1703-1783)

Date: 1752

"Assist me, Furies, with your hellish Aid, / Nor let the Tyrant Conscience more invade; / Since I am stain'd with Blood, thro' Blood I'll wade."

— Gentleman, Francis (1728-1784)

Date: 1763

"I know not, madam, what I either hear or see, a thousand things are crowding on my imagination; while, like one just wakened from a dream, I doubt which is reality, which delusion."

— Bickerstaff, Isaac (b. 1733, d. after 1808)

Date: w. 1764, published 1820

"O Peace of mind, thou lovely guest, / Thou softest soother of the breast, / Dispense thy balmy store."

— Goldsmith, Oliver (1728?-1774)

Date: 1765

"By reason's standard, then, you judge amiss / Of those whose legislator is caprice."

— Griffith, Elizabeth (1720-1793)

Date: 1767

"[I]ndeed, in her more serious moments, which are but few, she, perhaps, gives me an hearing, when all at once a crowd of gayer thoughts rush on, and kill at once the hopes wherewith I was elated a few minutes before"

— O'Keeffe, John (1747-1833)