Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit, like a hasty Flood, may over-run us, / And too much Sense has oftentimes undone us."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit is a Flux, a Looseness of the Brain, / And Sense-abstract has too much Pride to reign."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"For Sense, like Water, is but Wit condense, / And Wit, like Air, is rarify'd from Sense."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1704

"This is what I quote them for, and this is all my Argument demands; the deepest Search into the Region of Cause and Consequence, has found out just enough to leave the wisest Philosopher in the dark, to bewilder his Head, and drown his Understanding."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1706, 1709

"COME let me Love: or is my Mind / Harden'd to Stone, or froze to Ice?"

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: 1709, 1810

"Here in a green and shady grove, / Streams of pleasure mix with love: / There beneath the smiling skies / Hills of contemplation rise."

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

Date: Monday, March 3, 1712

"I can stifle any violent Inclination, and oppose a Torrent of Anger, or the Sollicitations of Revenge, with Success. But Indolence is a Stream which flows slowly on, but yet undermines the Foundation of every Virtue."

— Hughes, John (1678?-1720)

Date: 1719

"These Reflections oppress'd me for the second or third Day of my Distemper, and in the Violence, as well of the Fever, as of the dreadful Reproaches of my Conscience, extorted some Words from me, like praying to God, tho' I cannot say they were either a Prayer attended with Desires or with Hopes...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"These were the Subject of the first Night's Cogitation, after I was come home again, while the Apprehensions which had so over-run my Mind were fresh upon me, and my Head was full of Vapours, as above."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"The Thoughts of this sometimes sunk my very Soul within me, and distress'd my Mind so much that I could not soon recover it, to think what I should have done, and how I not only should not have been able to resist them, but even should not have had Presence of Mind enough to do what I might have...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)