Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804)

Hartley's Theory of the Human Mind, on the Principle of the Association of Ideas; with Essays Relating to the Subject of It

London

Printed for J. Johnson

1775

"To assist the imagination, indeed, but by no means in any consistency with the notion of a nervous fluid, it had been conceived that ideas resembled characters drawn upon a tablet; and the language in which we generally speak of ideas, and their affections, is borrowed from this hypothesis."

To assist the imagination, indeed, but by no means in any consistency with the notion of a nervous fluid, it had been conceived that ideas resembled characters drawn upon a tablet; and the language in which we generally speak of ideas, and their affections, is borrowed from this hypothesis. But neither can any such tablet be found in the brain, nor any style, by which to make the characters upon it; and though some of the more simple phænomena of ideas, as their being more or less deeply impressed, their being retained a longer or or a shorter time, being capable of being revived at pleasure, &c. may be pretty well explained by the hypothesis of such a tablet, and characters upon it, it is wholly inadequate to the explanation of other, and very remarkable phænomena of ideas, especially their mutual association. Besides, this hypothesis suggests nothing to explain any of the mental operations respecting ideas.
(viii-ix)

Writing::Tablet

Reading

At least 4 entries in ECCO and ESTC (1775, 1776, 1790).

See Hartley’s Theory of the Human Mind, on the Principle of the Association of Ideas; With Essays Relating to the Subject of It. By Joseph Priestley, LL. D. F. R. S. (London: Printed for J. Johnson, No. 72, St. Paul’s Church-Yard, 1775). <Link to ESTC>

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07/22/2011