Date: 1666

"The composition of all poems is or ought to be of wit, and wit in the poet, or wit writing (if you will give me leave to use a school distinction), is no other than the faculty of imagination in the writer, which, like a nimble spaniel, beats over and ranges through the field of memory, till it ...

— Dryden, John (1631-1700)

Date: 1687

The will may spur a lover on

— Ayres, Philip (1638-1712)

Date: 1745

"Keep strongly in the hot rebellious Mind, / Be it with Bits restrain'd, and Curbs confin'd. / The docile Horse in prime of Years is broke / To bear the Rein, or stretch beneath the Yoke."

— Whaley, John (bap. 1710, d. 1745)

Date: 1762?

"My heart a cage of birds unclean, / Its old corrupt affections feels, / Its strong propensity to sin; / And God in me no longer dwells."

— Wesley, John and Charles

Date: w. 1789, 1804

"While Vanity unveils her whiffling flags, / Her glittering trinkets, and her tawdry rags-- / Spreads spangled nets, and fills her philter'd bowl, / To fix each Sense, and fascinate the Soul-- / Her birdlime twigs contrived with such sly Art, / That while they tangle thoughts, they trap the heart...

— Woodhouse, James (bap. 1735, d. 1820)