Date: March, 1778

"And my similitude between a watch in its case, and the soul in its material frame, will, I persuade myself, be agreeable to all my readers, whose dispositions are mild, and like better to be pleased with what they read, than to attack it."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: March, 1778

"An antient philosopher indeed, full of real or pretended honesty, declared it to be his wish that there were a window in his breast that every body might see the integrity and purity of his thoughts. It would be truly be very pretty and amusing if our bodies were transparent, so that we could se...

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: April, 1778

"Cicero, upon whose mind the advancing rays of celestial philosophy beamed with a brightness very admirable in a Pagan period of time, before the Sun of Righteousness arose, and shone forth in full splendour upon the world, informs us, in his Tusculan Questions, of a very remarkable interview bet...

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: April, 1778

"The sound of the mind we hear; but what it is we cannot tell. The music which it utters, its melody, its harmony, its discord, its variety of notes, have been written by Shakespeare with a wonderful degree of perfection, so as to be themselves to every cultivated reader. We have even gamuts and ...

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: April, 1778

"How then can we represent, by a sensible image, the mind as a theatre to its own actings? Let us conceive a spacious saloon, in which our thoughts and passions exert themselves, and let its walls be encrusted with mirrour, for the purpose of reflection, in the same manner that rooms in voluptuou...

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: April, 1778

"A Hypochondriack Preacher, would, I am sensible, be an anomalous character; for whatever part of his sermon should appear not quite intelligible, or at all unpleasant to his auditors, they might very fairly, though perhaps not very justly impute to the gloomy disease of his mind."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: April, 1778

"Were the grand idea of the theatre of conscience in its full extant, and with all its enjoyments to be constantly in our contemplation, we should not forfeit the higher approbation of ourselves, who are really judges for the paultry, inattentive, and transient plaudits of others."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I was totally spiritless and dejected; the idea of the approaching meeting,--and oh Sir, the idea of the approaching parting,--gave a heaviness to my heart, that I could neither conquer nor repress."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

If "I may now judge of the time to come, by the present state of my mind, the calm will be succeeded by a storm, of which I dread the violence"

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)

Date: 1778, 1779

"I cannot write the scene that followed, though every word is engraven on my heart."

— Burney [married name D'Arblay], Frances (1752-1840)