Date: 1791

"If you can but kindle in your mind any strong desire, if you can but keep predominant any wish for some particular excellence or attainment, the gusts of imagination will break away, without any effect upon your conduct, and commonly without any traces left upon the memory."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: 1791

"Every desire is a viper in the bosom, who, while he was chill, was harmless; but when warmth gave him strength, exerted it in poison."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

Date: 1791

"In his soul was the serpent coil'd round in his heart, hid from the light, as in a cleft rock"

— Blake, William (1757-1827)

Date: 1791

"This is that incense of the heart / Whose fragrance smells to heaven."

— Cotton, Nathaniel, the elder (1705-1788)

Date: 1791

"In the rich realms of polished taste, / Where judgment penetrates to find / The treasures of the unwrought mind, / Where conversation's ardent spirit / Refines from dross the ore of merit, / Where emulation aids the flame / And stamps the sterling bust of fame."

— West, Jane (1758-1852)

Date: 1791

"These modern Sapphos are conceited creatures, / They sport their thoughts as others do their features; / These but coquette it with a different part, / And seize the head, while others charm the heart."

— Falconar, Maria (b. 1771-) and Harriet (b. 1774-)

Date: 1791

The mind may be oppress'd with "weight of care"

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

Date: 1791

The mind may be milky

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

Date: 1791

The mind may be rent as when two adverse winds vex and blow the sable flood

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

Date: 1791

Gods are "swift as the traveller's thought"

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)