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Date: 1791

"The dissipation of thought, of which you complain, is nothing more than the vacillation of a mind suspended between different motives, and changing its direction as any motive gains or loses strength."

— Boswell, James (1740-1795)

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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)

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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)

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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)

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Date: 1791

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

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

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Date: 1791

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

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

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Date: 1791

The mind may be milky

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

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Date: 1791

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

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

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Date: 1791

Gods are "swift as the traveller's thought"

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

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Date: 1791

"He spake, and at his words grief like a cloud / Involved the mind of Hector dark around"

— Cowper, William (1731-1800)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.