Date: 1693

Thoughts may "transcend all the Bounds of Air, / And like a blazing Comet ... inflame my Sphere."

— Hawkshaw, Benjamin (1671/2-1738)

Date: 1693

"Some Glances of a State that's past I find, / Take up the Corners of my thoughtful Mind, / As cover'd Embers when they're blown, create / A Flame, and represent my former State."

— Hawkshaw, Benjamin (1671/2-1738)

Date: 1693

"Musick alone inflames my drooping Mind; / Nay, she would mount her Wings, and fly away, / Not be confin'd to this dull Lump of Clay, / Did not the Charms of Musick most divine / Unite, and things so wide, so close combine."

— Hawkshaw, Benjamin (1671/2-1738)

Date: 1704

"Remark your commonest pretender to a light within, how dark, and dirty, and gloomy he is without; as lanterns which, the more light they bear in their bodies, cast out so much the more soot and smoke and fuliginous matter to adhere to the sides."

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: May 10, 1704

"Besides, there is something individual in human minds that easily kindles at the accidental approach and collision of certain circumstances, which, though of paltry and mean appearance, do often flame out into the greatest emergencies of life."

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: 1710, 1734

"They indeed, who hold the soul of man to be only a thin vital flame, or system of animal spirits, make it perishing and corruptible as the body, since there is nothing more easily dissipated than such a being, which it is naturally impossible should survive the ruin of the tabernacle, wherein it...

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

Date: 1713

"In a Glass-House, the Workmen often fling in a small quantity of fresh Coals, which seems to disturb the Fire, but very much enlivens it. This seems to allude to a gentle stirring of the Passions, that the Mind may not languish."

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)