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Date: 1776-1789

"The dissolute tyranny of Commodus, the civil wars occasioned by his death, and the new maxims of policy introduced by the house of Severus, had all contributed to increase the dangerous power of the army, and to obliterate the faint image of laws and liberty that was still impressed on the minds...

— Gibbon, Edward (1737-1794)

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Date: 1781

"Let matter then be allowed to furnish the first materials; the enlightened mind, which by its operations upon these discovers truth, and pursues it through all its distant connections, must have powers as far superiour to that which gave the first impression, as PHIDIAS is superiour to the marble."

— Rotheram, John (1725–1789)

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Date: 1781, 1810

"Triumphant love, with still superior art, / Engraves their wonders on the Painter's heart."

— Seward, Anna (1742-1809)

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Date: 1783

"Secondly, The pleasure of Comparison arises from the illustration which the simile employed gives to the principal object; from the clearer view of it which it presents; or the more strong impression of it which it stamps upon the mind: and, thirdly, It arises from the introduction of a new, and...

— Blair, Hugh (1718-1800)

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Date: 1792

"They bade retentive memory on their mind / Impress each image, in distinctive lines / That mock'd erasure."

— Polwhele, Richard (1760-1838)

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Date: 1797

"Over the gloom of Schedoni, no scenery had, at any moment, power; the shape and paint of external imagery gave neither impression or colour to his fancy."

— Radcliffe [née Ward], Ann (1764-1823)

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Date: w. 1798, 1803-4

"He had perceived the presence and the power / Of greatness, and deep feelings had impressed / Great objects on his mind with portraiture / And colour so distinct that on his mind / They lay like substances, and almost seemed / To haunt the bodily sense."

— Wordsworth, William (1770-1850)

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Date: 1810

"Therefore, actual pictures of beloved friends would not be so eagerly coveted, but that we render this darling, internal image indistinct, by recalling it too frequently; as that strength of line, which gives sharpness and spirit to a copper-plate, becomes injured after a certain number of impre...

— Seward, Anna (1742-1809)

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Date: 1810

An internal image is like a copper plate: "By repeated use, the plate, if not retouched, will produce only a dim and shadowy mass, in which the features and countenance cannot be very distinctly discerned."

— Seward, Anna (1742-1809)

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Date: 1810

"Yes, it is beneath the constant glow of ardent imagination, that the impression, given by memory, has faded. Then it is that a good, nay even an indifferent picture, or a paper-profile of a dear lost friend, strengthens our recollection, in the same manner that retouching a copper-plate restores...

— Seward, Anna (1742-1809)

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