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Date: 1742 [see first edition, 1733]

"The Mind, like a Tabula rasa, easyly receives the first Impression; and, like that, when the first Impression is deeply made, it with Difficulty admits of an Erasement of the first Characters, which in some Minds are indelible"

— Cooke, Thomas (1703-1756)

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Date: 1739

"YET I would not say with some, that the Soul is a meer Rasa Tabula; because I do not think that is a proper Metaphor in this Case."

— Hancock, John (fl. 1739)

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Date: January 1739

"Her enemy, therefore, is obliged to take shelter under her protection, and by making use of rational arguments to prove the fallaciousness and imbecility of reason, produces, in a manner, a patent under her hand and seal."

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

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Date: 1741

"In this, therefore, I am forced to differ from that great Philosopher and Master of Reason, Mr. Locke, who denies and argues against all innate Ideas in general, and of every Kind: He supposes the Soul originally to be as a rasa Tabula, or Blank without any Impression, or distingui...

— Morgan, Thomas (d. 1743)

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Date: 1756

"But the Truth is, this unnatural Power corrupts both the Heart, and the Understanding. And to prevent the least Hope of Amendment, a King is ever surrounded by a Crowd of infamous Flatterers, who find their Account in keeping him from the least Light of Reason, till all Ideas of Rectitude and Ju...

— Burke, Edmund (1729-1797)

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Date: 1757

"Since, therefore, the mind of man appears of so loose and unsteddy a contexture, that, even at present, when so many persons find an interest in continually employing on it the chissel and the hammer, yet are they not able to engrave theological tenets with any lasting impression; how much more ...

— Hume, David (1711-1776)

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Date: 1769

"The learned and ingenious Brown, in his Procedure of the Understanding, observes that 'common sense and Reason, to them who will use them in a plain Way, make it evident that we have no immediate or direct Idea or Perception of Sprit, or any of its Operations, as we have of Body and its Qualitie...

— Jackson, W., of Lichfield Close (fl. 1769)

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Date: 1770

"It is a favourite maxim with Mr LOCKE, as it was with some ancient philosophers, that the human soul, previous to education, is like a piece of white paper, or tabula rasa, and this simile, harmless as it may appear, betrays our great modern into several important mistakes."

— Beattie, James (1735-1803)

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Date: 1794

"The mind is not a rasa tabula, though, at the same time, it must be allowed, we gain no actual knowledge of the latent ideas which it possesses, but as they are awakened by reflection and experience."

— Sullivan, Richard Joseph, Sir (1752-1806)

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Date: 1794

"The rasa tabula will not allow us to have mental ideas."

— Sullivan, Richard Joseph, Sir (1752-1806)

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