Date: 1691

"Thou like as a Refiner doth / The Gold and Silver try, / We had much dross until thou didst / Our Souls, Lord, purifie."

— Keach, Benjamin (1640-1704)

Date: 1691

"And besides who knows but the Same Observation may hold true in Men, which is in Metals, That those of the strongest and noblest Substance, are hardest to be Polisht."

— Blount, Thomas Pope, Sir (1649-1697)

Date: 1691

"So innocent is the Soul of Kainophilus, so like fair white Paper, wherein you may presently see the least blot or speck of dirt that happens to fall upon it."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"But though there is nothing in this Book I have cudgel'd my Brains about, yet I must confess, during my Prenticeship, I was a kind of Persecutor of Nature, and would fain then have chang'd the dull Lead of my Brain into finer Mettal."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"How wind ye my Hearts of Gold?"

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"As for the Loves of these Villagers, the Intriegues of their Amours are not a little remarkable, they being very pretty Animals when disguis'd with that Passion: They are Tinder to such Flames, being quickly set on fire, even by the least spark, which when it hath catch'd the Match of their Soul...

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"Sometimes he describ'd the Humors of the Greenwich Usurers, who, as he exprest it, had Hearts of Marble and Entrals of Brass."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1692

With "sweat and pain" the philosopher may "Digg Mines of disputable Oar."

— Norris, John (1657-1712)

Date: 1692

"Or grant some Knowledge dwells below, / 'Tis but for some few years to stay / Till I'm set loose from this dark House of Clay, / And in an Instant I shall all things know."

— Norris, John (1657-1712)

Date: 1692

"Shall only Honour then he conjoyn'd with the Body, and with an inferiour Body, as is that of a Worm, and to the imprisoning of a Gem so precious as that, in the mire and Dirt of a filthy Morasse."

— Gildon, Charles (1665-1724)