Date: 1745

"However, let us make the best use we can of that little light which Scripture and reason have let in upon this dark and important subject."

— Mason, John (1706-1763)

Date: 1746

"Come with those downcast Eyes, sedate and sweet, / Those Looks demure, that deeply pierce the Soul; / Where, with the Light of thoughtful Reason mix'd, / Shines lively Fancy and the feeling Heart."

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1746

"These are the sacred feelings of thy heart, / Thy heart inform'd by reason's purer ray, / O Lyttelton, the friend!"

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1746

"Social friends, / Attuned to happy unison of soul; / To whose exalting eye a fairer world, / Of which the vulgar never had a glimpse, / Displays its charms; whose minds are richly fraught / With philosophic stores, superior light; / And in whose breast, enthusiastic, burns / Virtue, the sons of ...

— Thomson, James (1700-1748)

Date: 1746, 1753

"They [the passions], at once, surround us, and evade us, as the LIGHT does; -- By, and through it, we see all Things--But Itself remains invisible."

— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)

Date: 1746, 1753

"Fear is elusive sorrow, shunning pain; / Active--yet, stop'd--it dims the doubtful brain; / Spirit snatch'd inward, stagnating, by dread, / Slow, thro' the limbs, crawls cold, the living lead: / Form'd to the look, that moulds th' assumer's face, / His joints catch tremblings--life's moist strin...

— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)

Date: 1746, 1753

"Nature loves change--Cold night succeeds to morn: / And pity's dark'ning opposite is Scorn"

— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)

Date: 1746, 1753

Love "'Tis like soft air, through which admitted light / Peoples pleas'd fancy, and lends shape to sight: / Yet, like that air, disturb'd, man's quiet breaks, / Tempests his reason, and his triumph shakes."

— Hill, Aaron (1685-1750)

Date: 1746

"As, from the center of the lamp of day, / Beams after beams-diffusive sweetly play" so flows sweet joy from "the passions of the generous mind"

— Ruffhead, James

Date: 1747, 1811

"'Yes, if his soul to reason's rule resign'd, / 'And heaven's own views fair-opening on his mind,/ 'Caught from bright nature's flame the living ray, / 'Through passion's cloud pour'd in resistless day; / 'And taught mankind in reas'ning Pride's despite, / 'That God is wise, and all that is righ...

— Mason, William (1725-1797)