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Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Let any one examine his own Thoughts, and throughly search into his Understanding, and then let him tell me, Whether all the original Ideas he has there, are any other than of the Objects of his Senses, or of the Operations of his Mind, considered as Objects of his Reflection: and how great a ma...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

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Date: 1691

"These Reasons were supported by the impressions which the Duke's Charms had made in the Princess's Spirit, and she would have been glad to hide the inclination of her heart under a pretext of policy; but her mind was still so replenished with the Ideas of her confinement, and the state of her Fo...

— Anonymous

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Date: 1702

But if ideas "remain in the Soul when I was only thinking of a Horse, whereever they are bestow'd, it may be presum'd, there is room for that one idea more without thrusting out another to give it place: and when that one is among them, I see no more reason why they must be all new imprest, than ...

— Trotter, Catherine, later Cockburn, (1674?-1749)

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Date: Wednesday, July 2, 1712

"Perhaps there may not be room in the Brain for such a variety of Impressions, or the Animal Spirits may be incapable of figuring them in such a manner, as is necessary to excite so very large or very minute Ideas."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

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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: 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: 1735, 1763

"Turn'd on its self its num'rous wants are seen, / And all the mighty void that lies within / Yet cannot wisdom stamp our joys complete; / 'Tis conscious virtue crowns the blest retreat."

— Melmoth, William, the younger (bap. 1710, d. 1799)

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Date: 1741

"So for Instance, in Children; they perceive and forget a hundred Things in an Hour; the Brain is so soft that it receives immediately all Impressions like Water or liquid Mud, and retains scarce any of them: All the Traces, Forms or Images which are drawn there, are immediately effaced or closed...

— Watts, Isaac (1674-1748)

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Date: 1759

"His mind is continually occupied with what is too grand and solemn, to leave any room for the impressions of those frivolous objects, which fill up the attention of the dissipated and the gay."

— Smith, Adam (1723-1790)

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Date: 1760

"These first impressions are called ideas, which are lodged in this repository of the memory, in these marks, by running which over, I can raise the same ideas, when I please, which differ from their first appearance only in this, that, on their return, they come with the familiarity of a former ...

— Johnstone, Charles (c.1719-c.1800)

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