Date: 1767

"But however properly arranged those materials may be, and however thoroughly digested this intellectual food, an original Genius will sometimes find an inconveniency resulting from it; for as no man can attend to and comprehend many different things at once, his mental faculties will in some cas...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"Nature supplies the materials of his compositions; his senses are the under-workmen, while Imagination, like a masterly Architect, superintends and directs the whole. Or, to speak more properly, Imagination both supplies the materials, and executes the work, since it calls into being 'things tha...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"It may be easily conceived therefore, that an original Poetic Genius, possessing such innate treasure (if we may be allowed an unphilosophical expression) has no use for that which is derived from books, since he may be encumbered, but cannot be inriched by it; for though the chief merit of ordi...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"One obvious effect of it is, that it confines the attention to artificial rules, and ties the mind down to the observance of them, perhaps at the very time that the imagination is upon the stretch, and grasping at some idea astonishingly great, which however it is obliged, though with the utmost...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"Poetic Genius in particular cannot flourish either in uninterrupted SUNSHINE, or in continual SHADE. It languishes under the blazing ardor of a summer noon, as its buds are blasted by the damp fogs and chilling breath of a winter sky."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"It is, that though the progress of Literature, Criticism and Civilization, have contributed to unfold the powers and extend the empire of Reason; have taught men to think more justly, as well as to express their sentiments which more precision."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"Imagination is that faculty whereby the mind not only reflects on its own operations, but which assembles the various ideas conveyed to the understanding by the canal of sensation, and treasured up in the repository of the memory, compounding or disjoining them at pleasure; and which, by its pla...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1768

"How the history of Utopia holds up in the mirror of fancy, the picture of a well policied state, its arts, its laws, and government?"

— Wynne, Edward (1734-1784)

Date: 1769

"Vain therefore, and entirely to be rejected, is that Principle published to the World, by a celebrated Philosopher of the last Century, namely, that the Soul in its first created State, has nothing in it, but is a mere Rasa Tabula, or blank Paper."

— Law, William (1686-1761)

Date: 1769

"For every Creature of this World, animate or inanimate, is in its Degree, a Microcosm of all the Powers, that are in the great World, of which it is a Part."

— Law, William (1686-1761)