Date: 1775

"Need we the influence of the northern star / To string our nerves and steel our hearts to war? "

— Gray, Thomas (1716-1771)

Date: 1786

"'While in his Breast he bears, to Fear unknown, / 'A rigid Heart of Iron or of Stone!"

— Polwhele, Richard (1760-1838); Moschus

Date: 1786

"With Iron Bosom, tho' the Beast he slew, / The Charms of melting Love Alcides knew!"

— Polwhele, Richard (1760-1838); Moschus

Date: 1786

Friendship " bade my stubborn Bosom feel, / And soften'd thus a Heart of Steel!"

— Polwhele, Richard (1760-1838); Moschus

Date: 1787

"For scenes that frequent shapes of Death impart / Arm the firm breast, and steel the manly heart"

— Pye, Henry James (1745-1813)

Date: 1803

"What though Astrea decks my soul in gold, / My mortal lumber trembles with the cold;"

— Chatterton, Thomas (1752-1770)

Date: 1803

"Sermons, though flowing from the sacred lawn, / Are flimsy wires from reason's ingot drawn."

— Chatterton, Thomas (1752-1770)

Date: 1817

"Not until my dream became / Like a child's legend on the tideless sand. / Which the first foam erases half, and half / Leaves legible"

— Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822)

Date: w. 1821, 1840

"The sacred links of that chain have never been entirely disjoined, which descending through the minds of many men is attached to those great minds, whence as from a magnet the invisible effluence is sent forth, which at once connects, animates, and sustains the life of all"

— Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822)

Date: w. 1821, 1840

"It is as it were the interpretation of a diviner nature through our own; but its footsteps are like those of a wind over the sea, which the coming calm erases, and whose traces remain only as on the wrinkled sand which paves it."

— Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822)