Date: 1660, 1668

"Have you not seen an early-rising Lark / Spring from her Turf, making the Sun her mark, / Shooting her self aloft, yet higher, higher, / Till she had sung her self into Heaven's Quire? / Thus would he rise in Pray'r, and in a trice / His Soul become a Bird of Paradise."

— Wild, Robert (1615/16-1679)

Date: 1693

""And tho' all Joys have left me far behind, / I'll chew the Cudd of Pleasure in my Mind, / And so at least in Thought I will be Young again."

— Ames, Richard (bap. 1664?, d. 1692)

Date: 1706

"O'er the broad lands, and cross the tide, / On fancy's airy horse I ride, / (Sweet rapture of the mind!) / Till on the banks of Ganges' flood, / In a tall ancient grove I stood / For sacred use design's."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1719

"My soul is like a wilderness, / Where beasts of midnight howl; / There the sad raven finds her place, / And there the screaming owl."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1733

"I see the Soul in pensive fit, / And mopeing like sick Linnet sit, / With dewy eye and moulting wing, / Unperch'd, averse to fly or sing."

— Green, Matthew (1696-1737) [pseud. Peter Drake, a Fisherman of Brentford]

Date: 1734

"Hail, holy souls, no more confin'd / To limbs and bones that clog the mind; / Ye have escap'd the snares, and left the chains behind."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1737 (also 1738, 1743, reprinted 1754)

"In rainy days keep double guard, / Or spleen will surely be too hard, / Which, like those fish by sailors met, / Flies highest, while its wings are wet."

— Green, Matthew (1696-1737)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"The high-born soul / Disdains to rest her heaven-aspiring wing / Beneath its native quarry."

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"From the blooming store / Of these auspicious fields, may I unblam'd / Transplant some living blossoms to adorn / My native clime: while far above the flight / Of fancy's plume aspiring, I unlock / The springs of ancient wisdom; while I join / Thy name, thrice honour'd! with the immortal praise ...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)

Date: 1744, 1772, 1795

"That name indeed / Becomes the rosy breath of love; becomes / The radiant smiles of joy, the applauding hand / Of admiration: but the bitter shower / That sorrow sheds upon a brother's grave, / But the dumb palsy of nocturnal fear, / Or those consuming fires that gnaw the heart / Of panting indi...

— Akenside, Mark (1720-1771)