Date: 1764

Perception is "a kind of drama, wherein some things are performed behind the scenes, others are represented to the mind in different scenes, one succeeding the another"

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"Such principles are parts of our constitution, no less than the power of thinking: reason can neither make nor destroy them; nor can it do any thing without them: it is like a telescope, which may help a man to see farther, who hath eyes; but without eyes, a telescope shows nothing at all."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"The fabric of the human mind is intricate and wonderful, as well as that of the structure of the human body. The faculties of the one are with no less wisdom adpated to their several ends, than the organs of the other."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"In the arts and sciences which have least connection with the mind, its faculties are the engines which we must employ; and the better we understand their nature and use, their defects and disorders, the more skilfully we shall apply them, and with the greater success."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"The painter, the poet, the actor, the orator, the moralist, and the statesman, attempt to operate upon the mind in different ways, and for different ends; and they succeed, according as they touch properly the strings of the human frame."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"His [Newton's] regulae philosophandi are maxims of common sense, and are practised every day in common life; and he who philosophizes by other rules, either concerning the material system, or concerning the mind, mistakes his aim."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"All that we know of the body, is owing to anatomical dissection and observation, and it must be by an anatomy of the mind that we can discover its powers and principles."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1764

"But the anatomist of the mind cannot have the same advantage."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1785

"The analogy between memory and a repository, and between remembering and retaining, is obvious and is to be found in all languages."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)

Date: 1785

"In later ages, Des Cartes was the first that pointed out the road we ought to take in those dark regions [of the mind]."

— Reid, Thomas (1710-1796)