Date: 1785
"He had a constitutional melancholy, the clouds of which darkened the brightness of his fancy, and gave a gloomy cast to his whole course of thinking: yet, though grave and awful in his deportment, when he thought it necessary or proper, he frequently indulged himself in pleasantry and sportive s...
preview | full record— Boswell, James (1740-1795)
Date: 1785
"The propriety of the expression, 'the sunshine of the breast', now struck me with peculiar force; for the brilliant rays penetrated into my very soul."
preview | full record— Boswell, James (1740-1795)
Date: 1785
"I was delighted with this flash bursting from the cloud which hung upon his mind, closed my letter directly, and joined the company."
preview | full record— Boswell, James (1740-1795)
Date: 1785
"At a great school there is all the splendour and illumination of many minds; the radiance of all is concentrated in each, or at least reflected upon each."
preview | full record— Boswell, James (1740-1795)
Date: 1790
"All the splendour of the highest prosperity can never enlighten the gloom with which so dreadful an idea must necessarily over-shadow the imagination; nor, in a wise and virtuous man, can all the sorrow of the most afflicting adversity ever dry up the joy which necessarily springs from the habit...
preview | full record— Smith, Adam (1723-1790)
Date: 1791
"I have a wonderful superstitious love of mystery; when, perhaps, the truth is, that it is owing to the cloudy darkness of my own mind."
preview | full record— Boswell, James (1740-1795)
Date: 1793
" When painful truths invade the mind, / Ev'n wisdom wishes to be blind, / And hates th' officious ray."
preview | full record— Blacklock, Thomas (1721-1791)
Date: 1796
"Reason's dying lamp / Scarce brighter burns than instinct in their breast"
preview | full record— Bruce, Michael (1746-1767)