Date: 1777

"The philosophical doctrine of the slow recession of bodies from the sun, is a lively image of the reluctance with which we first abandon the light of virtue."

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1777

"For it is in moral as in natural things, the motion in minds as well as bodies is accelerated by a nearer approach to the centre to which they are tending."

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1777

"But the heart, that natural seat of evil propensities, that little troublesome empire of the passions, is led to what is right by slow motions and imperceptible degrees."

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1777

"The vast conceptions which enable a true genius to ascend the sublimest heights, may be so connected with the stronger passions, as to give it a natural tendency to fly off from the strait line of regularity; till good sense, acting on the fancy, makes it gravitate powerfully towards that virtue...

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1777

"It is not astonishing that the frail body, when the spirit is carried away by the magnificence of its own ideas ... that the frail body, which is the natural victim of pain, disease, and death, should not always be able to follow the mind in its aspiring flights, but should be as imperfect as if...

— More, Hannah (1745-1833)

Date: 1777, 1810

"Then in his bosom bright ideas teem; / Each tender, each exalted theme."

— Stockdale, Percival (1736-1811)

Date: 1777

"At present in my brain there floats / A thousand parti-colored motes; / From which, if time would but permit, / I might sift some sparks of wit."

— Savage, Mary (fl. 1763-1777)

Date: 1778, 1779

"A confused idea now for the first time entered my head, something I had heard of the rules of assemblies; but I was never at one before,--I have only danced at school,--and so giddy and heedless I was, that I had not once considered the impropriety of refusing one partner, and afterwards accepti...

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I was thunderstruck at the recollection: but, while these thoughts were rushing into my head, Lord Orville, with some warmth, said, 'This lady, Sir, is incapable of meriting such an accusation!'"

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"Almost instantly, the whole truth of the transaction seemed to rush upon her mind, and her wrath was inconceivably violent."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)