"If Old and New i'th Brain together crowd, / How is it Room and Peace is them allow'd? /How do they and their Equipages come? /For if Material, they must take up room. / And tract of Time would hoard up such a Crop, / The crowded Atoms would the Channels stop, / And choke the Passages of Vision up."
— Heyrick, Thomas (bap. 1649. d. 1694)
Place of Publication
Cambridge
Publisher
Printed by John Hayes for the Author, And are to be sold by Francis Hicks ... And by Thomas Basset ... and Samuel Heyrick
Date
1691
Metaphor
"If Old and New i'th Brain together crowd, / How is it Room and Peace is them allow'd? /How do they and their Equipages come? /For if Material, they must take up room. / And tract of Time would hoard up such a Crop, / The crowded Atoms would the Channels stop, / And choke the Passages of Vision up."
Metaphor in Context
If these Impulses to the Eye do give,
That thence doth an Account of things receive;
The Sense, that only did from Motion grow,
When Motion sinks and dies, must perish too.
How haps it then, Ideas stay behind,
And, when We please, can paint anew the Mind,
When what created them is fled, like Wind?
If th' Eye into't nothing Material drew,
How is't the Mind can former Objects view,
And dress i'th' Brain the wandring Schemes anew?
How haps, what did unto our Sight advance,
In Dreams again i'th' cheated Soul do dance,
And with fresh Charms the credulous Mind entrance?
Dreams that arise, as all the Learned own,
From confus'd Parts of Bodies seen or known.
If thro the Eye the Vigorous Object darts
Into the Brain these small Aerial Parts;
How are they entertain'd, when Crowds do come?
How do the little narrow Cells make room?
Do all, that to an Object do belong,
Into one Place unmixt with others throng?
If not: how are things past call'd back with ease?
How is, what's gone, remember'd, when We please,
Even Adjuncts and Particularities?
But if new Streams the former do expell,
How is't of former Days we acts can tell?
The various Turns of Years long-since repeat;
What We've seen acted, what We've read, relate.
If Old and New i'th Brain together crowd,
How is it Room and Peace is them allow'd?
How do they and their Equipages come?
For if Material, they must take up room.
And tract of Time would hoard up such a Crop,
The crowded Atoms would the Channels stop,
And choke the Passages of Vision up.
(ll. 243-272)
That thence doth an Account of things receive;
The Sense, that only did from Motion grow,
When Motion sinks and dies, must perish too.
How haps it then, Ideas stay behind,
And, when We please, can paint anew the Mind,
When what created them is fled, like Wind?
If th' Eye into't nothing Material drew,
How is't the Mind can former Objects view,
And dress i'th' Brain the wandring Schemes anew?
How haps, what did unto our Sight advance,
In Dreams again i'th' cheated Soul do dance,
And with fresh Charms the credulous Mind entrance?
Dreams that arise, as all the Learned own,
From confus'd Parts of Bodies seen or known.
If thro the Eye the Vigorous Object darts
Into the Brain these small Aerial Parts;
How are they entertain'd, when Crowds do come?
How do the little narrow Cells make room?
Do all, that to an Object do belong,
Into one Place unmixt with others throng?
If not: how are things past call'd back with ease?
How is, what's gone, remember'd, when We please,
Even Adjuncts and Particularities?
But if new Streams the former do expell,
How is't of former Days we acts can tell?
The various Turns of Years long-since repeat;
What We've seen acted, what We've read, relate.
If Old and New i'th Brain together crowd,
How is it Room and Peace is them allow'd?
How do they and their Equipages come?
For if Material, they must take up room.
And tract of Time would hoard up such a Crop,
The crowded Atoms would the Channels stop,
And choke the Passages of Vision up.
(ll. 243-272)
Provenance
Searching in HDIS (Poetry); found again "brain" and "crowd"
Date of Entry
08/30/2005
