"Like a mirrour, it [memory] reflects faithful images of the objects formerly perceived by us, but can exhibit no form with which it is not in this manner supplied. It is in its nature a mere copier; it preserves scrupulously the very position and arrangement of the original sensations, and gives us along with this, a perception of their having been at some past time present to the mind."
— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)
Work Title
Place of Publication
London and Edinburgh
Publisher
Printed for W. Strahan, T.Cadell, and W. Creech
Date
1774
Metaphor
"Like a mirrour, it [memory] reflects faithful images of the objects formerly perceived by us, but can exhibit no form with which it is not in this manner supplied. It is in its nature a mere copier; it preserves scrupulously the very position and arrangement of the original sensations, and gives us along with this, a perception of their having been at some past time present to the mind."
Metaphor in Context
Memory is confined to a review of those objects which have once been present to sense. It gives a sort of duration to the perceptions which sense has conveyed, but it can create no new perceptions. Like a mirrour, it reflects faithful images of the objects formerly perceived by us, but can exhibit no form with which it is not in this manner supplied. It is in its nature a mere copier; it preserves scrupulously the very position and arrangement of the original sensations, and gives us along with this, a perception of their having been at some past time present to the mind. It is thus precisely the reverse of invention.
(I.ii, pp. 28-9)
(I.ii, pp. 28-9)
Categories
Provenance
Reading in C-H Lion
Citation
Only 1 entry in ESTC (1774).
An Essay on Genius. By Alexander Gerard, D.D. Professor of Divinity in King's College, Aberdeen. (London: Printed for W. Strahan; T. Cadell, and W. Creech at Edinburgh 1774). <Link to ECCO>
An Essay on Genius. By Alexander Gerard, D.D. Professor of Divinity in King's College, Aberdeen. (London: Printed for W. Strahan; T. Cadell, and W. Creech at Edinburgh 1774). <Link to ECCO>
Date of Entry
06/27/2013
