Date: 1773

"The traces which her brain could now only recollect, were such as did not admit of any object long; I had passed over it in the moment of my entrance, and it now wandered from the idea; she paid no regard to my caresses, but pushed me gently from her, gazing stedfastly in an opposite direction t...

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1773

"Such were the working thoughts which swelled the breast / Of generous BOSWEL."

— Barbauld, Anna Letitia [née Aikin] (1743-1825)

Date: 1774

"That Bride, if reason may presume / To judge by things past, things to come, / In future times will tread the stage, / Equally form'd for love and rage, / Whilst Pope for comic humour famed, / Shall live when Clive no more is named."

— Lloyd, Robert (bap. 1733, d. 1764)

Date: 1774

"Ye self-will'd herd, call Reason to unbend / Your ill-warp'd minds, and to her theme attend."

— Bennet, John (fl. 1774-1796)

Date: 1774

"A multitude of ideas, collected by such an imagination, form a confused chaos, in which inconsistent conceptions are often mixt, conceptions so unsuitable and disproportioned, that they can no more be combined into one regular work, than a number of wheels taken from different watches, can be un...

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"There is in the human mind a strong propensity to make excursions; which may naturally be expected to exert itself most in those who have the greatest quickness and compass of imagination."

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"Thus imagination is no unskilful architect; it collects and chuses the materials; and though they may at first lie in a rude and undigested chaos, it in a great measure, by its own force, by means of its associating power, after repeated attempts and transpositions, designs a regular and well-pr...

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"Were reason only slow in her determinations, in comparison with the quickness with which fancy conceives, like Una's dwarf, lagging behind her far away, even this would greatly impede the work of genius, retard its progress, or stop it altogether by constantly curbing the impetuosity of fancy."

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"Opposite forces in mechanics tend to destroy one another. This is analogous to the case before us. The objects strictly connected with a passion are naturally fit for introducing ideas related to themselves; the passion acts in a contrary direction, and endeavours to keep the mind from running o...

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Date: 1774

"A strong perception, like a deep shade of colouring, seems to decay more slowly than one that is faint and delicate; and though it should decay as fast, it would be longer before it were effaced."

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)