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Date: 1718 [first published 1684-1694]

"And not our Houses alone, when (as SOPHOCLES has it) they stand long untenanted, run the faster to ruine, but Mens natural parts lying unemployed for lack of Acquaintance with the World, contract a kind of filth or rust and craziness thereby."

— Plutarch (c. 46-120)

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Date: February 22, 1723

"Let not your heart, / Where late her beauteous image was inshrin'd, / Be now immur'd with marble from her pray'r!"

— Fenton, Elijah (1683-1730)

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Date: 1724

"Without such a Miracle, since the Soul and Body act mutually upon one another, and the Tabernacle of Clay is the weakest part of the Compound, it must at last be overborn and thrown down."

— Cheyne, George (1671-1743)

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Date: 1724

"This cold clay cottage is but the soul's prison, / And death, at worst, is but a surly friend, / Who conquers to give liberty."

— Savage, Richard (1697/8-1743)

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Date: 1728, 1729, 1736

"She form'd this image of well-bodied air, / With pert flat eyes she window'd well its head, / A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead, / And empty words she gave, and sounding strain, / But senseless, lifeless! idol void and vain!"

— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)

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Date: 1731

"Where I would only demand of these Philosophers, Whether this their so expert Smith or Architect, the Active Understanding, when he goes about his Work, doth know what he is to do with these Phantasms before-hand, what he is to make of them, and unto what Shape to bring them? I...

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)

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Date: 1734

"Loosed from its bonds my spirit fled away, / And left behind its moving tent of clay."

— Adam [Adams], Jean (1710-1765)

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Date: 1735, 1745

"Only to trifle sev'nty Years away / In this frail Flesh, this Tenement of Clay, / In Doubt, in Fear, in Sorrow, in Despair, / Then cease to be, and vanish into Air?"

— Trapp, Joseph (1679-1747)

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Date: May 6, 1736

"To express this to us by Similitudes both just and beautiful; some Philosophers compare an human Soul to an empty Cabinet, of inexpressible Value for the Matter and Workmanship: and particularly, for the wonderful Contrivance of it, as having all imaginable Conveniencies within, for treasuring u...

— Denne, John (1693-1767)

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Date: 1742

"My soul is dead, my heart is stone, / A cage of birds and beasts unclean, / A den of thieves, a dire abode / Of dragons, but no house of God."

— Wesley, John and Charles

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