Date: 1651
"Many erroneous opinions are about the essence and original of [the rational soul]; whether it be fire, as Zeno held; harmony, as Aristoxenus; number, as Xenocrates; whether it be organical, or inorganical; seated in the brain, heart or blood; mortal or immortal; how it comes into the body."
preview | full record— Burton, Robert (1577-1640)
Date: 1659
"The minde is sometimes a Bull, sometimes a Serpent, and sometimes a flame of fire; and then the musick of the soule is quite out of tune; the Bells ring backward as in some general conflagration."
preview | full record— Tubbe, Henry (1618-1655)
Date: 1762
"Whence Order, Elegance, and Beauty move / Each finer sense, that tunes the Mind to Love; / Whence all that Harmony and Fire that join, / To form a Temper, and a Soul like thine."
preview | full record— Carter, Elizabeth (1717-1806)
Date: 1769
"The first reverend sage who delivered himself on this mysterious subject, having stroked his grey beard, and hemmed thrice with great solemnity, declared that the soul was an animal; a second pronounced it to be the number three, or proportion; a third contended for the number seven, or harmony;...
preview | full record— Smollett, Tobias (1721-1777)
Date: June, 1793
"'Tis fancy, powerful fancy wings / The poet's flight whene'er he sings, / Fancy strikes the living lyre, / Fancy sheds poetic fire!"
preview | full record— Anonymous
Date: April 20, 1796
"Ere yet we were, / Our finer tones of mind some guardian spirit / Touch'd into harmony; and, when we met, / Th' according strings struck forth a sound so sweet, / That heav'n itself might listen! love! ev'n love, / That brand of discord, burns within our bosoms, / Pale—cold—before the steady fla...
preview | full record— Lee, Sophia (bap. 1750, d. 1824)