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Date: May 10, 1704

"Thus far, I suppose, will easily be granted me; and then it will follow that, as the face of nature never produces rain but when it is overcast and disturbed, so human understanding, seated in the brain, must be troubled and overspread by vapours ascending from the lower faculties to water the ...

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

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Date: 1704

"Words drop like Hony from his Lips, his Mind / Is wav'ring and unconstant, as the Wind."

— Anonymous

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Date: May 10, 1704

"For the upper region of man is furnished like the middle region of the air, the materials are formed from causes of the widest difference, yet produce at last the same substance and effect. Mists arise from the earth, steams from dunghills, exhalations from the sea, and smoke from fire; yet all ...

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

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Date: May 10, 1704

"Thus far, I suppose, will easily be granted me; and then it will follow that as the face of Nature never produces rain but when it is overcast and disturbed, so human understanding seated in the brain must be troubled and overspread by vapours ascending from the lower faculties to water the inve...

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)

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Date: Tuesday, October 22, 1706

"Sometimes it is acted by the evil Spirit of general Vogue, and like a meer Possession 'tis hurry'd out of all manner of common Measures; to day it obeys the Course of things and submits to Causes and Consequences; to morrow it suffers Violence from the Storms and Vapours of Human Fancy, operated...

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

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Date: 1706 [first published 1658]

"Serenity or Sereneness, clearness of the Sky, fair Weather, calmness of Mind, chearfulness of Looks."

— Phillips, Edward (1630-1696)

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Date: 1706

"What God, averse to Innocence and Love, / Cou'd shake thy gentle Soul with such a Storm?"

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

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Date: 1706

"And oh impute not one unheeded Word, / Forc'd from her in the bitterest Pangs of Sorrow, / When fierce conflicting Passions strove within, / Like all the Winds at once let loose upon the Main, / When wild Distraction rul'd."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)

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Date: 1706

A woman's "Reason [may be] Shipwrack'd upon her Passion, and the Hulk of her Understanding lies thumping against the Rock of her Fury"

— Vanbrugh, Sir John (1664-1726)

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Date: 1707, 1710

"Nor should such ruffling Storms molest / The Halcyon Smoothness of thy Breast / Doubt, Avarice, and the pale Multitude / Of greedy Harpyes, which intrude / Ev'n at our Meals, no Entrance find / On the strong Armour of your Mind, / Which You can straiten or unbend."

— Cobb, Samuel (bap. 1675, d. 1713)

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