Date: 1159

"What is more remarkable, every one of us carries in his heart a book of knowledge, opened by the exercise of reason."

— John of Salisbury (c. 1115-1180)

Date: 1159

"In this [book of reason] are portrayed not only the forms of all visible things and nature in general; the invisible things of the Fabricator of all things are also written down by the very hand of God."

— John of Salisbury (c. 1115-1180)

Date: 1576

"Then the bookes of conscience shall be opened. Then shall the dead be judged by those thinges which are written in the booke: for theyr works do folow them."

— Gascoigne, George (1534/5- - 1577)

Date: 1590?, 1623

"Read over Julia's heart, thy first, best love."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1590?, 1623

"Gentle girl, assist me, / And e'en in kind love I do conjure thee, / Who art the table wherein all my thoughts / Are visibly charactered and engraved / To lesson me, and tell me some good mean / How with my honour I may undertake / A journey to my loving Proteus."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1594

"The soul of man being therefore at the first as a book, wherein nothing is and yet all things may be imprinted; we are to search by what steps and degrees it riseth unto perfection of knowledge."

— Hooker, Richard (1554-1600)

Date: 1596

"In this respect [conscience] may fitly be compared to a notarie, or a register that hath alwaies the penne in his hand, to note and record whatsoeuer is saide or done: who also because he keepes the rolles and records of the court, can tell what hath bin said and done many hundred yeares past."

— Perkins, William (1558-1602)

Date: 1597

"I took him for the plainest harmless creature / That breathed upon the earth, a Christian, / Made him my book wherein my soul recorded / The history of all her secret thoughts."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1598

"Therefore even as an index to a book, / So to his mind was young Leander's look."

— Marlowe, Christopher (bap. 1564, d. 1593)

Date: 1599

"This Scripture [Proverbs 18:14] is not only worthie to be graven in steele with the pen of an Adamant, and to be written in letters of gold: but also to bee laid up and registred by the finger of Gods spirit in the tables of our hearts."

— Greenham, Richard (e. 1540s-1594)