Date: January 28, 1753

"I have heard that his understanding was rather hurt by the absolute retirement in which he lived, and indeed he had an imagination too lively to be trusted to itself; the treasures of it were inexhaustible, but for want of commerce with mankind he made that rich oar into bright but useless medal...

— Montagu [née Robinson], Elizabeth (1718-1800)

Date: 1754

"Such high regard on Piety I place, / On pure simplicity of life; a breast / Steel'd against bribes, by naked truth possess'd, / And with a spotless rigid conscience blest"

— Duncombe, John (1729-1786) [pseud.]

Date: 1755

"Had not Guilt steel'd thy Heart, awakening Conscience / Wou'd flash Conviction on thee, and each Look, / Shot from these Eyes, be arm'd with Serpent-Horrors, / To turn thee into Stone!"

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1755

"His bold Resolves have steel'd ZAPHIRA's Breast / Against thy Love"

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: w. 1757, 1758

"What Briton wears a heart, steel'd to the touch / Of gentle Pity? "

— Dodd, William (1729-1777)

Date: 1759

"Their grief, however, like their joy, was transient; every thing floated in their mind unconnected with the past or future, so that one desire easily gave way to another, as a second stone cast into the water effaces and confounds the circles of the first."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1760

"Whene'er he visits us with Racks of Pain, / And speeds the rapid Fever in each Vein, / Our drossy Souls the potent Fire refines,/ Till the bright Ore in polish'd Beauty shines"

— Langhorne,William (1721-1772)

Date: 1760-7

"Honours, like impressions upon coin, may give an ideal and local value to a bit of base metal; but Gold and Silver will pass all the world over without any other recommendation than their own weight."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1760-7

"There was the great king Aldrovandus, and Bosphorus, and Capadocius, and Dardanus, and Pontus, and Asius,--to say nothing of the iron-hearted Charles the XIIth, whom the Countess of K***** herself could make nothing of"

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1762

"He therefore had been little used to any woman but his sober and sensible grand-mother's two cousins who were pretty enough, but had no great charms of understanding; a sister rather silly, and the incomparable Harriot, whose wit was as sound as her judgment solid and sterling, free from affecta...

— Scott [née Robinson], Sarah (1720-1795)