Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Let us then suppose the Mind to be, as we say, white Paper, void of all Characters, without any Ideas; How comes it to be furnished?"

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Whence comes that vast store, which the busy and boundless Fancy of Man has painted on it, with an almost endless variety?"

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"For, though he that contemplates the Operations of his Mind, cannot but have plain and clear Ideas of them; yet unless he turn his Thoughts that way, and considers them attentively, he will no more have clear and distinct Ideas of all the Operations of his Mind, and all that may be observed ther...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"I know it is an Opinion, that the Soul always thinks, and that it has the actual Perception of Ideas in it self constantly, as long as it exists; and that actual thinking is as inseparable from the Soul, as actual Extension is from the Body; which if true, to enquire after the beginning of a Man...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"To think often, and never retain it so much as one moment, is a very useless sort of thinking: and the Soul in such a state of thinking, does very little, if at all, excel that of a Looking-glass, which constantly receives variety of Images, or Ideas, but retains none; they disappear and vanish,...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Characters drawn on Dust, that the first breath of wind effaces; or Impressions made on a heap of Atoms, or animal Spirits, are altogether as useful, and render the Subject as noble, as the Thoughts of a Soul that perish in thinking; that once out of sight, are gone for ever, and leave no memory...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"In all that great Extent wherein the mind wanders, in those remote Speculations, it may seem to be elevated with, it stirs not one jot beyond those Ideas, which Sense or Reflection have offered for its Contemplation."

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"These simple Ideas, when offered to the mind, the Understanding can no more refuse to have, nor alter, when they are imprinted, nor blot them out, and make new ones in it self, than a mirror can refuse, alter, or obliterate the Images or Ideas, which, the Objects set before it, do therein produce."

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Having also given a power to our Minds, in several Instances, to chuse, amongst its Ideas, which it will think on, and to pursue the enquiry of this or that Subject with consideration and attention, to excite us to these Actions of thinking and motion, that we are capable of, has been ple...

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"And so we should neither stir our Bodies, nor employ our Minds; but let our Thoughts (if I may so call it) run a drift, without any direction or design; and suffer the Ideas of our Minds, like unregarded shadows, to make their appearances there, as it happen'd, without attending to them."

— Locke, John (1632-1704)