Date: 1706
"And therefore wert thou bred to virtuous Knowledge, / And Wisdom early planted in thy Soul; / That thou might'st know to rule thy fiery Passions, / To bind their Rage, and stay their headlong Course."
preview | full record— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)
Date: 1708, 1714
"But the knowledg of our Passions in their very Seeds, the measuring well the Growth and Progress of Enthusiasm, and the judging rightly of its natural Force, and what command it has over our very Senses, may teach us to oppose more successfully those Delusions which come arm'd with the specious ...
preview | full record— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)
Date: November 25, 1707; 1708
"Oh! do not, do not blast the springing Hopes / Which thy kind Hand has planted in my Soul."
preview | full record— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)
Date: Tuesday, June 28, to Thursday, June 30, 1709
"For this reason, I sat by an eminent story-teller and politician who takes half an ounce in five seconds, and has mortgaged a pretty tenement near the town, merely to improve and dung his brains with this prolific powder."
preview | full record— Steele, Sir Richard (1672-1729)
Date: 1710, 1714
"For company is an extreme provocative to fancy and, like a hotbed in gardening, is apt to make our imaginations sprout too fast."
preview | full record— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)
Date: 1710, 1714
"So that, if there be no certain inspector or auditor established within us to take account of these opinions and fancies in due form and minutely to animadvert upon their several growths and habits, we are as little like to continue a day in the same will as a tree, during the summer, in the sam...
preview | full record— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)
Date: May 10, 1711
"The Seeds of Punning are in the Minds of all Men, and tho' they may be subdued by Reason, Reflection, and Good Sense, they will be very apt to shoot up in the greatest Genius that is not broken and cultivated by the Rules of Art."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Monday, March 19, 1711
"Extinguish Vanity in the Mind, and you naturally retrench the little Superfluities of Garniture and Equipage. The Blossoms will fall of themselves, when the Root that nourishes them is destroyed."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Wednesday, June 13, 1711
"When therefore the obscene Passions in particular have once taken Root and spread themselves in the Soul, they cleave to her inseparably, and remain in her for ever, after the Body is cast off and thrown aside."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Monday, June 18, 1711
"The latter [the fool and his passions] is like the Owner of a barren Country that fills his Eye with the Prospect of naked Hills and Plains, which produce nothing either profitable or ornamental; the other [the wise man and his ideas] beholds a beautiful and spacious Landskip divided into deligh...
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)