Date: w. 1746, 1797

"His youthful breast, by years mature refin'd, / May shine the mirror of thy blameless mind."

— Mason, William (1725-1797)

Date: 1798

"Women have a frame of body more delicate and susceptible of impression than men, and, in proportion as they receive a less intellectual education, are more unreservedly under the empire of feeling."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"Wounded affection, wounded pride, all those principles which hold absolute empire in the purest and loftiest minds, urged her to still further experiments to recover her influence, and to a still more poignant desparation, long after reason would have directed her to desist, and resolutely call ...

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"Add to this, Mary had fixed her heart upon this chosen friend; and one of the last impressions a worthy mind can submit to receive, is that of the worthlessness of the person upon whom it has fixed all its esteem."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"But a connection more memorable originated about this time, between Mary and a person of her own sex, for whom she contracted a friendship so fervent, as for years to have constituted the ruling passion of her mind."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"I believe it may be admitted as a maxim, that no person of a well furnished mind, that has shaken off the implicit subjection of youth, and is not the zealous partizan of a sect, can bring himself to conform to the public and regular routine of sermons and prayers."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"She had also suffered a disappointment, which preyed upon her mind."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"Her heart was the seat of every benevolent feeling; and accordingly, in all her intercourse with children, it was kindness and sympathy alone that prompted her conduct."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"The original plan of Mary, respecting her residence in France, had no precise limits in the article of duration; the single purpose she had in view being that of an endeavour to heal her distempered mind."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)

Date: 1798

"The gloominess of her mind communicated its own colour to the objects she saw; and in this temper she began a series of Letters on the Present Character of the French Nation, one of which she forwarded to her publisher, and which appears in the collection of her posthumous works."

— Godwin, William (1756-1836)