Date: 1661

"The Microcosm, little world, or Man, / Containeth all the outward great world can."

— Pordage, Samuel (bap. 1633, d. c. 1691)

Date: 1667

"How vain a thing is Man, whose noblest part, / That Soul which through the World doth rome, / Traverses Heav'n, finds out the depth of Art, / Yet is so ignorant at home?"

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1667

"I wonder not to find those that know most, / Profess so much their Ignorance; / Since in their own Souls greatest Wits are lost, / And of themselves have scarce a glance."

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1667

"A Soul self-mov'd which can dilate, contract, / Pierces and judges things unseen: / But this gross heap of Matter cannot act, / Unless impulsed from within."

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1667

"So unconcern'd she lives, so much above / The Rubbish of a sordid Jail, / That nothing doth her Energy improve / So much as when those structures fail."

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1667

"It is our narrow thoughts shorten these things, / By their companion Flesh inclin'd; / Which feeling its own weakness gladly brings / The same opinion to the Mind."

— Philips [née Fowler], Katherine (1632-1664)

Date: 1679

"'Tis sure, thy heart hath too too many leaks, / Which sacred things let out, and then let in / Satans suggestions, the world, and sin"

— Slater, Samuel (c.1629-1704)

Date: 1718, 1747

"A piece of sculpture admirably wrought is put out to view, but, to preserve it against the injuries of the weather, or for some other reason, is varnished over. Every body extols the artist, and is pleased with his work; and yet no one sees that which was the immediate subject of his art, being ...

— Grove, Henry (1684-1738)

Date: 1755

"They say this town is full of cozenage, / Drug-working sorcerers that change the mind; / Soul-killing witches that deform the body; / And many such like libertines of sin."

— Shakespeare [from Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language]

Date: 1755

"That souls of animals infuse themselves / Into the trunks of men"

— Shakespeare [from Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language]