Date: 2000

"It's the medium-sized thoughts that jump ship in an emergency."

— Edward St. Aubyn (b. 1960)

Date: 1719

"I expected every Wave would have swallowed us up, and that every time the Ship fell down, as I thought, in the Trough or Hollow of the Sea, we should never rise more; and in this Agony of Mind, I made many Vows and Resolutions, that if it would please God here to spare my Life this one Voyage, i...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1743

"Upon this, my Son Swane invaded the Coasts with several Ships, and committed many outragious Cruelties; which, indeed, did his business, as they served me to apply to the Fear of this King, which I had long since discovered to be his predominant Passion."

— Fielding, Henry (1707-1754)

Date: 1855, 1856

"Ah, these currents spin one's head round almost as much as they do the ship."

— Melville, Herman (1819-1891)

Date: 1726

"Here I discovered the Roguery and Ignorance of those who pretend to write Anecdotes, or secret History who send so many Kings to their Graves with a Cup of Poison; will repeat the Discourse between a Prince and Chief Minister, where no Witness was by; unlock the Thoughts and Cabinets of E...

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: 1726

"But the whole Scene of this Voyage made so strong an Impression on my Mind, and is so deeply fixed in my Memory, that in committing it to Paper I did not omit one material Circumstance."

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: 1726

"Reason alone is sufficient to govern a Rational Creature; which was therefore a Character we had no Pretence to challenge"

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

Date: 1855, 1856

"'Ah, my dear Don Amasa,' Don Benito once said, 'at those very times when you thought me so morose and ungrateful--nay when, as you now admit, you half thought me plotting your murder--at those very times my heart was frozen; I could not look at you, thinking of what, both on board this ship and ...

— Melville, Herman (1819-1891)

Date: 1691

"Here cou'd I easily step over, with the Feet of my Fancy (wider then ten thousand Colossus's, though one of them be big enough for a Ship to Sail between its Legs) to all the Spires in London."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1691

"This Voyage round the World was made in the Ship of Fancy, which every one knows, like the Cossaks Boats, sails as well by Land as Water.--And now I hope you are satisfied."

— Dunton, John (1659–1732)

Date: 1721

"Her Mind well suited the fair Cabinet that contained it; she was humble, generous, unaffected, yet learned, wise, modest, and prudent above her Years or Sex; gay in Conversation, but by Nature thoughtful; had all the Softness of a Woman, with the Constancy and Courage of a Hero: In fine, her Sou...

— Aubin, Penelope (1679?-1731?)

Date: 1719

"In the midst of the greatest Composures of my Mind, this would break out upon me like a Storm, and make me wring my Hands, and weep like a Child."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"Discomposure of the Mind" must "be as great a Disability as that of the Body"

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

A "strange Impression upon the Mind, from we know not what Springs, and by we know not what Power," may over-rule us

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I thought the Impression was so strong upon my Mind, that it could not be resisted, that it must come from some invisible Direction"

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"During the long Time that Friday has now been with me, and that he began to speak to me, and understand me, I was not wanting to lay a Foundation of religious Knowledge in his Mind."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I found it was not so easy to imprint right Notions in his Mind about the Devil, as it was about the Being of a God."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"At that very Word my Heart, as I thought, died within me, and I fell backwards upon the Side of my Bed where I sat, into the Cabbin."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"[M]y Heart was as it were dead within me, partly with Fright, partly with Horror of Mind and the Thoughts of what was yet before me."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I say, I do not wonder that they bring a Surgeon with it, to let him Blood that very Moment they tell him of it, that the Surprize may not drive the Animal Spirits from the Heart, and overwhelm him."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"When I came to the Place, my very Blood ran chill in my Veins, and my Heart sunk within me at the Horror of the Spectacle."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I thought of nothing then but the Hill falling upon my Tent, and all my Houshold Goods, and burying all at once; and this sunk my very Soul within me a second time."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I call'd a Council, that is to say, in my Thoughts, whether I should take back the Raft, but this appear'd impracticable."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"The Words were very apt to my Case, and made some Impression upon my Thoughts at the time of reading them"

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"It would take up a larger Volume than this whole Work is intended to be, to set down all the Contrivances I hatch'd, or rather brooded upon in my Thought."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"It is as impossible as needless, to set down the innumerable Crowd of Thoughts that whirl'd through that great Thorowfair of the Brain, the Memory, in this Night's Time."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

There may be a "Flood of Joy" in the breast

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

One may have "several times loud Calls from [his] Reason and [his] more composed Judgment to go home"

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1777

"You would not bid me adieu till the ship was getting under way: I believe you judged aright, if you meant to spare us both: the bustle of the scene, the rattling of the sails, the noise of the sailors, had a mechanical effect on the mind, and stifled those tender feelings, which we indulge in so...

— Mackenzie, Henry (1745-1831)

Date: 1719

"I was not so much surpriz'd with the Lightning, as I was with a Thought which darted into my Mind as swift as the Lightning it self: O my Powder!"

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: Published serially, 1765-1770

"[A]nd then it was that my Sins came crowding into my Mind, and I believe I was the only Person of the Ship's Company who trembled"

— Brooke, Henry (c. 1703-1783)

Date: 1733

"Amurath himself was also in the Fleet, and and hearing that the Tunis Vessel was commanded by the Renegado Dragut, and that he had some young Men on board arm'd, and three Women, one of them an admirable Beauty, he made them all come on board his Ship. He presently knew Rosalinda, whose Picture ...

— Morando, Bernardo (1589-1656); Gaspard-Moïse-Augustin de Fontanieu; Anonymous

Date: 1719

"In a Word, I had nothing about me but a Knife, a Tobacco-pipe, and a little Tobacco in a Box; this was all my Provision, and this threw me into terrible Agonies of Mind, that for a while I run about like a Mad-man."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"No one, that shall ever read this Account, will expect that I should be able to describe the Horrors of my Soul at this terrible Vision, I mean, that even while it was a Dream, I even dreamed of those Horrors; nor is it any more possible to describe the Impression that remain'd upon my Mind, whe...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"These Reflections oppress'd me for the second or third Day of my Distemper, and in the Violence, as well of the Fever, as of the dreadful Reproaches of my Conscience, extorted some Words from me, like praying to God, tho' I cannot say they were either a Prayer attended with Desires or with Hopes...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"These were the Subject of the first Night's Cogitation, after I was come home again, while the Apprehensions which had so over-run my Mind were fresh upon me, and my Head was full of Vapours, as above."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"[A]nd this I must observe with Grief too, that the Discomposure of my Mind had too great Impressions also upon the religious Part of my Thoughts, for the Dread and Terror of falling into the Hands of Savages and Canibals, lay so upon my Spirits, that I seldom found my self in a due Temper for Ap...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"The Thoughts of this sometimes sunk my very Soul within me, and distress'd my Mind so much that I could not soon recover it, to think what I should have done, and how I not only should not have been able to resist them, but even should not have had Presence of Mind enough to do what I might have...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"There are some secret moving Springs in the Affections, which when they are set a going by some Object in View, or be it some Object, though not in View, yet render'd present to the Mind by the Power of Imagination, that Motion carries out the Soul by its Impetuosity to such violent eager Embrac...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"Pray note, all this was the Fruit of a disturb'd Mind, an impatient Temper, made as it were desperate, by the long Continuance of my Troubles, and the Disappointments I had met in the Wreck I had been on Board of, and where I had been so near the obtaining what I so earnestly long'd for, viz. so...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I threw down the Book, and with my Heart as well as my Hands lifted up to Heaven, in a Kind of Extasy of Joy, I cry'd out aloud, Jesus, thou Son of David, Jesus, thou exalted Prince and Saviour, give me Repentance!

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I bad him go to the Tree, and bring me Word if he could see there plainly what they were doing; he did so, and came immediately back to me, and told me they might be plainly view'd there; that they were all about their Fire, eating the Flesh of one of their Prisoners; and that another lay bound...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"In a word, as the Sea was returned to its Smoothness of Surface and settled Calmness by the Abatement of that Storm, so the Hurry of my Thoughts being over, my Fears and Apprehensions of being swallow'd up by the Sea being forgotten, and the Current of my former Desires return'd, I entirely forg...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I found indeed some Intervals of Reflection, and the serious Thoughts did, as it were, endeavour to return again sometimes, but I shook them off, and rouz'd my self from them as it were from a Distemper, and applying my self to Drinking and Company, soon master'd the Return of those Fits, for so...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"I now began to consider seriously my Condition, and the Circumstance I was reduc'd to, and I drew up the State of my Affairs in Writing, not so much to leave them to any that were to come after me, for I was like to have but few Heirs, as to deliver my Thoughts from daily poring upon them, and a...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"Then terrible Thoughts rack'd my Imagination about their having found my Boat, and that there were People here; and that if so, I should certainly have them come again in greater Numbers and devour me; that if it should happen so that they should not find me, yet they would find my Enclosure, de...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"[B]ut to see with what Fear I went forward, how often I look'd behind me, how I was ready every now and then to lay down my Basket, and run for my Life, it would have made any one have thought I was haunted with an evil Conscience, or that I had been lately most terribly frighted, and so indeed ...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1723

"The first Transports of his Passion being thus conquered, he began to be resigned"

— Aubin, Penelope (1679?-1731?)

Date: 1723

"[Y]ou must use your Reason; conquer that Passion which is now unlawful and injurious to your repose"

— Aubin, Penelope (1679?-1731?)

Date: 1719

"[N]ay, they were not subjected to so many Distempers and Uneasinesses either of Body or Mind, as those were, who by vicious Living, Luxury and Extravagancies on one Hand, or by hard Labour, want of Necessaries, and mean or insufficient Diet on the other Hand, bring Distempers upon themselves by ...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1719

"As long as I kept up my daily Tour to the Hill to look out, so long also I kept up the Vigour of my Design, and my Spirits seem'd to be all the while in a suitable Form for so outragious an Execution as the killing twenty or thirty naked Savages, for an Offence which I had not at all entred into...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)