Date: w. 350 B.C.

"Generally, about all perception, we can say that a sense is what has the power of receiving into itself the sensible forms of things without the matter, in the way in which a piece of wax takes on the impress of a signet-ring without the iron or gold; what produces the impression is a signet of ...

— Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)

Date: 1632

"Looke as it is with a Gold smith that melteth the metall that he is to make a vessell of, if after the melting thereof, there follow a cooling, it had beene as good it had never beene melted, it is as hard, haply harder, as unfit, haply unfitter, then it was before to make vessell of; but after ...

— Hooker, Richard (1554-1600)

Date: 1641

"As Lots wife was turned into a Pillar of Salt, that her inconstancie might be fixt, and yet be melting still: So, thou, my Soule, if I had my wish, shouldst be turned into a Pillar of Thoughts; that thy volubility might be restrain'd, and yet be thinking still."

— Baker, Richard, Sir (c. 1568-1645)

Date: 1661

"GRACE though she could have with one single dart / The stubborn Will pierc'd th'row her Steely heart."

— Pordage, Samuel (bap. 1633, d. c. 1691)

Date: 1679

"With him [Chirst] I live, his word I hear, yet feel / No yielding to him in this heart of Steel."

— Slater, Samuel (c.1629-1704)

Date: 1685

"Look, as iron put into the fire becomes all fiery, so the soul dwelling in the God of dove, becomes all love, all delight, all joy."

— Flavell, John (bap. 1630, d. 1691)

Date: 1761, 1790

"Such then is God, a spirit pure refin'd / From all material dross, and such the human mind."

— Jenyns, Soame (1704-1787); Browne, Isaac Hawkins (1706-1760)

Date: w. 1755, 1777

"She [Nature] employs it [spiritual substance] as a kind of paste or clay; modifies it into a variety of forms and existences; dissolves after a time each modification, and from its substance erects a new form."

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: w. 1755, 1777

"And does any thing steel the breast of judges and juries against the sentiments of humanity but reflections on necessity and public interest?"

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

Date: 1778

"Education, and good company are necesary to polish the mind----but can any education, or any company, convey a fine understanding, where it has not been given by nature?"

— Caulfield (fl. 1778)