Date: 1773

"A gush of tenderness swelled her heart at the sight--She burst into tears--But the crisis of her fate was come--and she entered the carriage, which drove off at a furious rate, Camplin commanding the postilion to make as much speed as was possible."

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1774

"Genius implies likewise activity of imagination. Whenever a fine imagination possesses healthful vigour, it will be continually starting hints, and pouring in conceptions upon the mind.

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"The largest river takes its rise from some small fountain; issuing from this, it rolls its streams over a long extent of country, and is enlarged during its course by the influx of many rivulets derived from springs no more considerable than its own, till at last it becomes an impassable torrent...

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1777

"My father was far from being so once; but misfortune has now given his mind a tincture of sadness."

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1777

One may perceive "a tincture of melancholy enthusiasm" in the mind

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: April, 1783

"And we must be content to rest upon the surface without straining to pierce into causes which are hidden from us, and which have hitherto mocked the attempts of impatient philosophers. We should resolve to wait till a longer fathom line is granted us, and then we shall be able to sound depths wh...

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: 1783

"Some, indeed, there are, who, by a strength and dignity in their conceptions, and a current of high ideas that runs through their whole composition, preserve the reader's mind always in a tone nearly allied to the Sublime; for which reason they may, in a limited sense, merit the name of continue...

— Blair, Hugh (1718-1800)

Date: 1783

"[W]hat Horace observes of words is equally true of thoughts ... every superfluity is lost, like water poured into a vessel already full."

— Beattie, James (1735-1803)

Date: 1783

"Elegant speculations are sometimes found to float on the surface of the mind, while bad passions possess the interior regions of the heart."

— Blair, Hugh (1718-1800)

Date: 1784

"The minds of these, our fellow-creatures, that are now drowned in ignorance, being thus opened and improved, the pale of reason would be enlarged; Christianity would receive new strength; liberty new subjects."

— Ramsay, James (1733-1789)