Date: 1691
"Wandring one Evening thro' a Cypress Grove--(I won't be positive, it might be Hazle, but t'other sounds better) revolving in my rambling Brain the Varietyes of Human Affairs, happen'd i' the Drove of Thoughts, that swarm'd up and down my Noddle to reflect on my own self (Sir, Your Humble Servant...
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Let it suffice, that my Soul for ought I know, has been Rambling the best part of this 6000 Years, if those are in the right on't who hold the Præexistence, and that all Souls were made at once.
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"For as I was expatiating in Dungrove Fields, my Mind and Body rambling alike, neither cared or knew whether, I out of a Childish wantonness gathered a bearded Ear of Grass or Corn, and put it into my Throat, thrusting it down so far, that when I went to pull it up again, being against the grain,...
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Who has so many English Dictionaries in his Study, and another in his Head bigger than all together (and yet there's still room to spare both for Brains and Projects) Does not he?--nay--now you ruffle his smooth Soul, alter his fair Body, and discompose him all over."
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Towards the end of which Chapter Evander confesses his Wit has a little run away with him; so ungovernable a thing is towring Fancy, when not hand-cufft by powerful Reason, flying out against Learning, beloved Learning, at so Satyrical a rate as almost makes his heart bleed to read it, when he t...
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"'Tis true, my Master did advise me (for which I'll pay and ever owe him as many Thanks as Arithmetick can count) to beg my Father's Consent before I rambled again; but my runnagate Mind being set on a galloping Frollick, he might with as much ease have found out the Quadrature of a Circle, or th...
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"And when abroad I go, Fancy shall be / My skilful Coachman, and shall hurry me / Through Heaven and Earth, and Neptune's watery Plain, / And in a moment drive me back again."
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Oh the Oceans of Delight that now flow'd within me!"
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Nature returns, and now tho Business had fetter'd my Leggs, and my whole Life seem'd but as one Marriage-day, (such crouching was there now to the Rising Sun;) yet all this could not fix my little Carkass, or limit my roving Mind to a narrower Circuit than the whole Creation."
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)
Date: 1691
"Observe again, how greedily their Souls, keeping Sentinel in their Ears, lye and catch for words; and how their Souls, in a perpetual emanation gliding from their Eyes, waste themselves in passionate Glances, and suffer many a faint Swoon with gazing."
preview | full record— Dunton, John (1659–1732)