Date: 1597

"One of our souls had wandered in the air, / Banished this frail sepulchre of our flesh."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1696

"I cou'd resolve it soon, / Were this curst Being only in Debate. / But my Imoinda struggles in my Soul."

— Southerne, Thomas (1659-1746)

Date: 1702

"My Heart beats higher, and my nimble Spirits / Ride swiftly thro' their purple Channels round: / 'Tis the last blaze of Life: Nature revives / Like a dim, winking Lamp, that flashes brightly / With parting Light, and strait is dark for ever."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1700, 1702

"Each busie thought, that rouls within her breast, / Labours for him; the King, when first he sicken'd, / Declar'd he should succeed him in the Throne."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1700, 1702

"But whither does my roving fancy wander?"

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1703

"Oh wretched Husband! while she hangs about thee / With idle Blandishments, and plays the fond one, / Ev'n then her hot Imagination wanders, / Contriving Riot, and loose scapes of Love."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1703

"Trust not to that; / Rage is the shortest Passion of our Souls, / Like narrow Brooks that rise with sudden Show'rs, / It swells in haste, and falls again as soon; / Still as it ebbs the softer Thoughts flow in, / And the Deceiver Love supplies its place."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: 1703

"I thought that nothing cou'd have stay'd my Soul, / That long e'er this her Flight had reach'd the Stars; / But thy known Voice has lur'd her back again."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: November 25, 1707; 1708

"'Tis wonderful indeed; and yet great Souls, / By Nature half divine, soar to the Stars, / And hold a near Acquaintance with the Gods."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

Date: November 25, 1707; 1708

"No!--'tis my Glory that the Christian Light / Has dawn'd, like Day, upon my darker Mind, / And taught my Soul the noblest use of Reason; / Taught her to soar aloft, to search, to know / The vast eternal Fountain of her Being."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)