Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"Invention is one of the great marks of genius; but if we consult experience, we shall find, that it is by being conversant with the inventions of others, that we learn to invent; as by reading the thoughts of others we learn to think."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"Our hearts frequently warmed in this manner, by the contact of those whom we wish to resemble, will undoubtedly catch something of their way of thinking, and we shall receive in our own bosoms some radiation at least of their fire and splendour."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"That disposition, which is so strong in children, still continues with us, of catching involuntarily the general air, and manner, of those with whom we are most conversant; with this difference only, that a young mind is naturally pliable and imitative; but in a more advanced state it grows rigi...

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"The mind is but a barren soil; is a soil soon exhausted, and will produce no crop, or only one, unless it be continually fertilised and enriched with foreign matter."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"The greatest natural genius cannot subsist on its own stock: he who resolves never to ransack any mind but his own, will be soon reduced from mere barrenness, to the poorest of all imitations; he will be obliged to imitate himself, and to repeat what he has before often repeated."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"A mind enriched by an assemblage of all the treasures of antient and modern Art, will be more elevated and fruitful in resources in proportion to the number of ideas which have been carefully collected and thoroughly digested."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"There can be no doubt but that he who has the most materials has the greatest means of invention; and if he has not the power of useing them, it must proceed from a feebleness of intellect; or from the confused manner in which those collections have been laid up in his mind."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"The fire of the artist's own genius operating upon these materials which have been thus diligently collected, will enable him to make new combinations, perhaps, superior to what had ever before been in the possession of the Art. / / As in the mixture of the variety of metals, which are said to h...

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"He will pick up from dunghills what by a nice chymistry, passing through his own mind, shall be converted into pure gold; and, under the rudeness of Gothic essays, he will find original, rational, and even sublime inventions."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1774; 1775

"Like a sovereign judge and arbiter of Art, he is possessed of that-presiding power which separates and attracts every excellence from every school; selects both from what is great, and what is little; brings home knowledge from the East and from the West; making the universe tributary towards fu...

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)