Date: 1620
"For when we try to recollect or call a thing to mind, if we have no prenotion or perception of what we are seeking, we seek and toil and wander here and there, as if in infinite space."
preview | full record— Bacon, Sir Francis, Lord Verulam (1561-1626)
Date: 1657
Fancy is "The roving, pregnant, busie, teeming sence."
preview | full record— Poole, Joshua (c.1615–c.1656)
Date: 1665
"Thus all the uncertainty, and mistakes of humane actions, proceed either from the narrowness and wandring of our Senses, from the slipperiness or delusion of our Memory, from the confinement or rashness of our Understanding, so that 'tis no wonder, that our power over natural causes and effects ...
preview | full record— Hooke, Robert (1635-1703)
Date: 1676
"But she has left a pleasing image of herself that wanders in my soul. It must not settle there."
preview | full record— Etherege, Sir George (1636-1691/2)
Date: 1686, 1689, 1697
"Indeed, whosoever considers the curious Inventions of Wit, the vast Comprehension and subtile Inferences of the Understanding, the wonderful Sagacity and Prospect of Prudence, the noble Endowments and Speculations of the Mind, the quick Transitions and Successions of Thoughts, together with the ...
preview | full record— Nourse, Timothy (c.1636–1699)
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."
preview | full record— Locke, John (1632-1704)
Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706
"A pestle and mortar will as soon bring any particle of matter to indivisibility, as the acutest thought of a mathematician; and a surveyor may as soon with his chain measure out infinite space, as a philosopher by the quickest flight of mind reach it, or by thinking comprehend it; which is to ha...
preview | full record— Locke, John (1632-1704)
Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706
"Nor let any one think these too narrow bounds for the capacious Mind of Man to expatiate in, which takes its flight farther than the Stars, and cannot be confined by the limits of the World; that extends its thoughts often even beyond the utmost expansion of Matter, and makes excursions into tha...
preview | full record— Locke, John (1632-1704)
Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706
"When the Ideas that offer themselves, (for as I have observed in another place, whilst we are awake, there will always be a train of Ideas succeeding one another in our Minds,) are taken notice of, and, as it were, registred in the Memory, it is Attention."
preview | full record— Locke, John (1632-1704)
Date: 1691
The Soul's a Particle of Heavenly fire, / And boldly doth to every thing aspire: / But yet how low Her lofty Flights do fall; / When She attempts the Wonders of this Ball!"
preview | full record— Heyrick, Thomas (bap. 1649. d. 1694)