Date: 1746

"Social friends, / Attuned to happy unison of soul; / To whose exalting eye a fairer world, / Of which the vulgar never had a glimpse, / Displays its charms; whose minds are richly fraught / With philosophic stores, superior light; / And in whose breast, enthusiastic, burns / Virtue, the sons of ...

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: Performed Dec 1756, published 1757

"Infernal fiends, if any fiends there are / More fierce than hate, ambition, and revenge, / Rise up and fill my bosom with your fires, / And policy remorseless!"

— Home, John (1722-1808)

Date: Performed Dec 1756, published 1757

"Thy inspiration, Lord! / Hath fill'd his bosom with that sacred fire, / Which in the breasts of his forefathers burn'd."

— Home, John (1722-1808)

Date: 1774

"It is enraptured by every striking form, it fills the soul with high enthusiasm, it sets the fancy on fire, it pushes it forward with impetuosity, renders all its conceptions glowing, and bestows a freedom and becoming negligence on its productions."

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)