Date: 1725-6

"And sweet discourse [is] the banquet of the mind."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Broome, W. and Fenton, E.

Date: 1725-6

"This is spoken with too great severity: it is necessary to relieve the mind of the reader sometimes with gayer scenes, that it may proceed with a fresh appetite to the succeeding entertainment."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Broome, W. and Fenton, E.

Date: 1725-6

"The moral then of these fables of Alcinous is, that a constant series of happiness intoxicates the mind, and that moderation is often learn'd in the school of adversity."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Broome, W. and Fenton, E.

Date: 1725-6

"[T]his last astonishes the Reader, and he is so intent upon it, that he has not attention to consider the absurdity in the manner of Ulysses's landing: In this moment when [Homer] perceives the mind of the Reader as it were intoxicated with these beauties, he steals Ulysses on shore, and dismiss...

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Broome, W. and Fenton, E.

Date: 1725-6

"Discourse [is] the sweeter banquet of the mind."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744), Broome, W. and Fenton, E.

Date: 1726

"O! teach me what is Good! teach me thy self! / Save me from Folly, Vanity and Vice, / From every low Pursuit! and feed my Soul, / With Knowledge, conscious Peace, and Vertue pure, / Sacred, substantial, never-fading Bliss!"

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: March 13, 1727

"And is not virtue in mankind / The nutriment that feeds the mind; / Upheld by each good action past, / And still continued by the last?"

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: 1733

"There St. John mingles with my friendly Bowl, / The Feast of Reason and the Flow of Soul."

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

Date: 1735-6

"See! the full board / That steams disgust, and bowls that give no joy; / No truth invited there, to feed the mind; / Nor wit, the wine-rejoicing reason quaffs."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1743

"Our needful knowledge, like our needful food, / Unhedged, lies open in life's common field, / And bids all welcome to the vital feast."

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)