Date: 1665

Minds are "like smooth paper never writ upon, / When folded up, by some impression / Marks will remain it never had before, / And ne're return to former smoothness more."

— Howard, Sir Robert (1626-1698)

Date: 1677

"I wou'd ha' rent / With my just hands that Rock, that Marble heart; / I wou'd have div'd through Seas of bloud to find it, / To tear the cruel Quarry from its Center."

— Lee, Nathaniel (1653-1692)

Date: 1687

"[B]ut thanks be prais'd the Generosity of our Cavaliers has open'd their obdurate Hearts with a Golden key, that let's 'em in at all opportunities"

— Behn, Aphra (1640?-1689)

Date: 1694

On may achieve a "noble conquest" over his own passions

— D'Urfey, Thomas (1653?-1723)

Date: 1694

"Pray mind me, Sir, to shew my Shape and Aire; that as the Loadstone does the Obedient Iron--should draw by force to me all Hearts but yours--."

— D'Urfey, Thomas (1653?-1723)

Date: 1751, 1768

"When reason rules, what glory does ensue."

— Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley [née Lady Mary Pierrepont] (1689-1762)

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...

— Lee, Sophia (bap. 1750, d. 1824)

Date: April 20, 1796

"Oh! that superior mind is gone for ever! / --Yet still, thus ruin'd, like a broken mirror, / It gives a perfect image in each fragment!"

— Lee, Sophia (bap. 1750, d. 1824)

Date: April 20, 1796

"Oh, farewell! / I cannot coin in words my soul's soft meaning!"

— Lee, Sophia (bap. 1750, d. 1824)