Date: 1742
"Our freedom chain'd; quite wingless our desire; / In sense dark-prison'd all that ought to soar / Prone to the centre; crawling in the dust; / Dismounted every great and glorious aim; / Embruted every faculty divine; / Heart-buried in the rubbish of the world."
preview | full record— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)
Date: 1744
"By toys entangled, or in guilt bemired, / [Ambition] turns a curse; it is our chain and scourge / In this dark dungeon, where confined we lie, / Close-grated by the sordid bars of sense; / All prospect of eternity shut out; / And, but for execution, ne'er set free."
preview | full record— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)
Date: 1751
"Thus a lively Imagination and unperceived Self-Love, fetter the Heart in certain ideal Bonds of their own creating: Till at length some turbulent and furious Passion arising in its Strength, breaks these fantastic Shackles which Fancy had imposed, and leaps to its Prey like a Tyger chained by Co...
preview | full record— Brown, John (1715-1766)
Date: 1753
"Sorrow renounces latitude of range: / Dwells in confinement's cave; where thought sits chain'd / Muses are shunn'd: and horror's winking lamp."
preview | full record— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)
Date: 1753
"Where shall a thoughtless youth this treasure find? / This art of judgment, that becalms the mind? / Chains anger short; and sets reflection free, / Gives tumult temper---and makes fortune see?"
preview | full record— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)
Date: 1759
"But the Nets woven by the human Imagination, altho' they are composed of the smallest Materials, are perhaps full as difficult to be broken as the strongest real Bonds"
preview | full record— Fielding, Sarah (1710-1768)
Date: 1762
"Ils sont sourds, en effet, à la voix intérieure qui leur crie d’un ton difficile à méconnaître: Une machine ne pense point, il n’y a ni mouvement, ni figure qui produise la réflexion: quelque chose en toi cherche à briser les liens qui le compriment; l’espace n’est pas ta mesure, l’univers entie...
preview | full record— Rousseau, Jean-Jacques (1712-1778)
Date: 1766
"Fancy leads the fetter'd senses / Captives to her fond controul; / Merit may have rich pretences, / But 'tis Fancy fires the soul."
preview | full record— Cunningham, John (1729-1773)
Date: 1772
"My Brain's disturb'd; alas! alas! I rave; / What can I do? a poor forsaken Slave! / Like Birds, that spend their little idle Rage, / And, fruitless, mourn, indignant of their Cage, / From Thought to Thought, my fluttering Spirits rove, / Betray'd to Bondage, and, ah! lost to Love."
preview | full record— Whyte, Samuel (1733-1811) [Editor]
Date: 1773
"Now here, now there, the roving Fancy flies, / Till some lov'd objects strikes her wand'ring eyes, / Whose silken fetters all the senses bind, / And soft captivity involves the mind."
preview | full record— Wheatley, Phillis (c.1753–1784)