Date: Saturday, December 21, 1751

"A careless glance upon a favourite author, or transient survey of the varieties of life, is sufficient to supply the first hint or seminal idea, which, enlarged by the gradual accretion of matter stored in the mind, is by the warmth of fancy easily expanded into flowers, and sometimes ripened in...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, February 12, 1751

"There are many diseases both of the body and mind, which it is far easier to prevent than to cure, and therefore I hope you will think me employed in an office not useless either to learning or virtue, if I describe the symptoms of an intellectual malady, which, though at first it seizes only th...

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, January 22, 1751

"It is certain, that, with or without our consent, many of the few moments allotted us will slide imperceptibly away, and that the mind will break, from confinement to its stated task, into sudden excursions."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, January 22, 1751

"But this invisible riot of the mind, this secret prodigality of being, is secure from detection, and fearless of reproach."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, January 22, 1751

"The infatuation strengthens by degrees, and like the poison of opiates, weakens his powers, without any external symptoms of malignity."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: Tuesday, January 22, 1751

"It is, perhaps, not impossible to promote the cure of this mental malady, by close application to some new study, which may pour in fresh ideas, and keep curiosity in perpetual motion."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1752

Pleasure is "the secret Spring that actuates man"

— Duncombe, John (1729-1786) [pseud.]

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: 1755

"Those who have much leisure to think, will always be enlarging the stock of ideas, and every increase of knowledge, whether real or fancied, will produce new words, or combinations of words."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)

Date: 1755

"Why did I not / Repent, while yet my Crimes were decibel! / Ere they had struck their Colours thro' my Soul, / As black as Night or Hell!"

— Brown, John (1715-1766)