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Date: Wednesday, January 9, 1712

"So great an Assembly of Ladies placed in gradual Rows in all the Ornaments of Jewels, Silk and Colours, gave so lively and gay an Impression to the Heart, that methought the Season of the Year was vanished; and I did not think it an ill Expression of a young Fellow who stood near me, that called...

— Steele, Sir Richard (1672-1729)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"And that outward objects by the different impressions they make on the organs of sense, communicate certain vibrative motions to the nerves; and these being filled with spirits, propagate them to the brain or seat of the soul, which according to the various impressions or traces thereby made in ...

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"But the ideas perceived by sense, that is, real things, are more vivid and clear, and being imprinted on the mind by a spirit distinct from us, have not a like dependence on our will."

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"You cannot say objects are in your mind, as books in your study: or that things are imprinted on it, as the figure of a seal upon wax."

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"Look you, Hylas, when I speak of Objects, as existing in the Mind, or imprinted on the Senses; I wou'd not be understood in the gross, literal Sense, as when Bodies are said to exist in a place, or a Seal to make an Impression upon Wax."

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"When, therefore, you say, all Ideas are occasioned by Impressions in the Brain, do you conceive this Brain or no? If you do, then you talk of Ideas imprinted in an Idea, causing that same Idea, which is absurd."

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: 1713, 1734

"Therefore, to explain the Phaenomena, is to shew how we come to be affected with Ideas, in that Manner and Series, wherein they are imprinted on our Senses."

— Berkeley, George (1685-1753)

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Date: September 10, 1726

"To explain this, we must consider that the first Image which an outward Object imprints on our Brain is very slight; it resembles a thin Vapour which dwindles into nothing, without leaving the least track after it. But if the same Object successively offers itself several times, the Image it occ...

— Arbuckle, James (d. 1742)

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Date: 1728

"With respect to the simple Perception of Mere Sense he is still upon the same Level with Brutes; he is altogether Passive; he retains all the Signatures and Impressions of outward Objects, but in the very Order only in which they are stamped; with Transposing or Altering, Dividing, or Compoundin...

— Browne, Peter (d. 1735)

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Date: 1760

"With how quick a succession, do days, months and years pass over our heads? -- how truly like a shadow that departeth do they flee away insensibly, and scarce leave an impression with us?"

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

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