Date: 1751

"In other cases, where the field of choice is wider, and where opposite motives counterbalance and work against each other, the mind fluctuates for a while, and feels itself more loose: but, in the end, must as necessarily be determined to the side of the most powerful motive, as the balance, aft...

— Home, Henry, Lord Kames (1696-1782)

Date: 1751

"The laws of mind, and the laws of matter, are in this respect perfectly similar; tho', in making the comparison, we are apt to deceive ourselves."

— Home, Henry, Lord Kames (1696-1782)

Date: 1751

"A weak motive makes some impression: but, in opposition to one more powerful, it has no effect to determine the mind. In the precise same manner, a small force will not overcome a great resistance; nor the weight of an ounce in one scale, counter-balance a pound in the other."

— Home, Henry, Lord Kames (1696-1782)

Date: 1751

"If any Man hath found out a Kind of Motive which doth not affect himself, he hath made a deeper Investigation into the 'Springs, Weights, and Balances' of the human Heart, than I can pretend to."

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1751

"Thus a lively Imagination and unperceived Self-Love, fetter the Heart in certain ideal Bonds of their own creating: Till at length some turbulent and furious Passion arising in its Strength, breaks these fantastic Shackles which Fancy had imposed, and leaps to its Prey like a Tyger chained by Co...

— Brown, John (1715-1766)

Date: 1751

"If the brain, or some part of it, were not in a manner the fountain of sensation and motion, and more peculiarly the seat of the mind than the other bowels or members of the body; why should a slight inflammation of its membranes cause madness, or a small compression of it produce a palsy or apo...

— Whytt, Robert (1714-1766)

Date: 1751

"Nay, Epicurus himself, according to Lucretius, did not look upon these two as separate beings, but regarded the mind as a kind of mouvement produced by the anima or soul."

— Whytt, Robert (1714-1766)

Date: 1751

"The mind, therefore, in producing the vital and other involuntary motions, does not act as a rational, but as a sentient principle; which, without reasoning upon the matter, is as necessarily determined by an ungrateful sensation or stimulus affecting the organs, to exert its power, in bringing ...

— Whytt, Robert (1714-1766)

Date: 1751

"Nay, while, in man, the brain is the principal seat of the soul, where it most eminently displays its powers; it seems to exist so equally through the whole bodies of insects, as that its power or influence scarce appears more remarkable in one part than another: and hence it is, that, in such c...

— Whytt, Robert (1714-1766)

Date: Tuesday, March 5, 1751

"[T]those who desire to partake of the pleasure of wit must contribute to its production, since the mind stagnates without external ventilation, and that effervescence of the fancy, which flashes into transport, can be raised only by the infusion of dissimilar ideas."

— Johnson, Samuel (1709-1784)