Date: Saturday, June 7, 1712
"There is nothing of greater Importance to us than thus diligently to sift our Thoughts, and examine all these dark Recesses of the Mind, if we would establish our Souls in such a solid and substantial Virtue as will turn to Account in that great Day, when it must stand the Test of infinite Wisdo...
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Monday, June 23, 1712
"The Mind of Man naturally hates every thing that looks like a Restraint upon it, and is apt to fancy it self under a sort of Confinement, when the Sight is pent up in a narrow Compass, and shortned on every side by the Neighbourhood of Walls or Mountains."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Monday, June 23, 1712
"But there is nothing that makes its Way more directly to the Soul than Beauty, which immediately diffuses a secret Satisfaction and Complacency through the Imagination, and gives a Finishing to any thing that is Great or Uncommon."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Saturday, June 28, 1712
"We may observe, that any single Circumstance of what we have formerly seen often raises up a whole Scene of Imagery, and awakens numberless Ideas that before slept in the Imagination; such a particular Smell or Colour is able to fill the Mind, on a sudden, with the Picture of the Fields or Garde...
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Monday, June 30, 1712
"There is yet another Circumstance which recommends a Description more than all the rest, and that is if it represents to us such Objects as are apt to raise a secret Ferment in the Mind of the Reader, and to work, with Violence, upon his Passions."
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: Wednesday, July 2, 1712
"The Understanding, indeed, opens an infinite Space on every side of us, but the Imagination, after a few faint Efforts, is immediately at a stand, and finds her self swallowed up in the Immensity of the Void that surrounds it"
preview | full record— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)
Date: 1712, 1715, 1719
"I will not repeat to you, Madam, the divers Conflicts of my Thoughts and the Agitation of my Mind on this Occasion; for my Interior labour'd as it were under a Fever and Ague, burning with an irresistible Inclination for Marcellus"
preview | full record— Barker, Jane (1675-1743)
Date: 1712, 1715, 1719
"[W]hen once Passion blinds us, Passion misguides us, Passion overthrows us, Passion destroys us, and no Passion so strong and so deceitful as that of Love; Love rocks our Reason into a Lethargy, and then does what it pleases with the rest of our Interior"
preview | full record— Barker, Jane (1675-1743)
Date: 1712, 1715, 1719
"Then since it is impossible to make my Heart cease from sighing Love, and my Mind from thinking Love, my Eyes from languishing, it is vain to command my Tongue to cease from declaring what all my interiour Passions dictate"
preview | full record— Barker, Jane (1675-1743)
Date: 1712
"When threat'ning Tides of Rage and Anger rise, / Usurp the Throne, and Reason's Sway despise, / When in the Seats of Life this Tempest reigns, / Beats thro' the Heart, and drives along the Veins, / See, Eloquence with Force perswasive binds / The restless Waves, and charms the warring Winds: Res...
preview | full record— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)