"But Adam's Soul being put in his Body, his Brain was a Tabula rasa, as White Paper, had no Impressions in it, but such as either God put in it, or such as came to him by his Senses."

— Burnet, Gilbert (1643-1715)


Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed for J. Walthoe, B. Tooke; J. Knapton, D. Midwinter, B. Cowse, and R. Robinson
Date
1720
Metaphor
"But Adam's Soul being put in his Body, his Brain was a Tabula rasa, as White Paper, had no Impressions in it, but such as either God put in it, or such as came to him by his Senses."
Metaphor in Context
The surest way to find out what this Image was at first, is to consider, what the New Testament says of it, when we come to be restored to it. We must put on the new Man, after the image of him that created him; or as elsewhere, the new man in righteousness and true holiness. This then was the Image of God, in which Man was at first made. Nor ought the Image of God to be considered only as an Expression that imports only our representing him here on Earth, and having Dominion over the Creatures: For in Genesis the Creation of Man in the image of God, is expressed as a thing different from his Dominion over the Creatures, which seems to be given to him as a consequent of it. The image of God seems to be this, That the Soul of man was a Being of another Sort and Order than all those material Beings till then made, which were neither capable of Thought nor Liberty, in which respect the Soul was made after the Image of God. But Adam's Soul being put in his Body, his Brain was a Tabula rasa, as White Paper, had no Impressions in it, but such as either God put in it, or such as came to him by his Senses. A Man born deaf and blind, newly come to hear and see, is not a more Ignorant and Amazed-like Creature than Adam must have been, if God had not conveyed some great Impressions into him; [end page 110] such as first the acknowledging and obeying him as his Maker, and then the managing his Body so as to make it an instrument, by which he could make use of and observe Creation. There is no reason to think that his Body was at first inclined to Appetite, and that his Mind was apt to serve his Body, but that both were restrained by supernatural Assistances: It is much more natural and more agreeable to the Words of the Wiseman, to think that God made man upright, that his Body craved modestly, and that his Mind was both Judge and Master of those Cravings; and if a natural Hypothesis may be offered, but only as an Hypothesis, it may be supposed, That a Man's Blood was naturally low and cool, but that it was capable of a vast Inflammation and Elevation, by which a Man's Powers might be exalted to much higher Degrees of Knowledge and Capacity: The Animal Spirits receiving their Quality from that of the Blood, a new and a strong Fermentation in the Blood might raise them, and by consequence exalt a man to a much greater sublimity of Thought: But with that it might dispose him to be easily inflamed by Appetites and Passions, it might put him under the power of his Body, and make his Body much more apt to be fired at outward objects, which might sink all Spiritual and pure Ideas in him, and raise gross ones with much Fury and Rapidity. Hereby his whole Frame might be corrupted, and that might go so deep in him, that all those who descended from him, might be defiled by it, as we see Madness and some Chronical Diseases pass from Parents to Children.
(pp. 110-1)k
Provenance
Searching "tabula rasa" in ECCO
Citation
Burnet, Gilbert. An Exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England. Written by Gilbert Late Lord Bishop of Sarum. 4th edition, corrected (London: Printed for J. Walthoe, B. Tooke; J. Knapton, D. Midwinter, B. Cowse, and R. Robinson, 1720).
Theme
Blank Slate
Date of Entry
10/09/2006

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