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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: 1770?

There are "Some, whose blank minds, no spark of mercy knew."

— Downman, Hugh (1740-1809)

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Date: 1773

Materialist philosophers describe "scoring Traces on the Paper Soul, / Blank, shaven white, they fill th' unfurnish'd Pate / With new Idéas, none of them innate."

— Byrom, John (1692-1763)

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