Date: Friday, April 14, 1727

"A Man of true Honour will as soon break open a Lock as a Letter, which does not belong to him; and pick his Neighbour's Pocket, as soon as discover his Nakedness in this Respect; for a Letter, being the Representative of the Person's Heart, who sends it, ought to pass, without Examination or Int...

— Caleb d'Anvers [pseud. for Nicholas Amhurst, Henry, Viscount Bolingbroke, and William Pulteney, Earl of Bath]

Date: Friday, April 21, 1727

"For though it is generally believed that few Statesmen are much afflicted with this terrible Inmate; yet, upon a careful Inspection of human Nature, I find it to be a vulgar Error; and am fully satisfied that, notwithstanding the outward placid Behaviour and smiling Aspect of t...

— Caleb d'Anvers [pseud. for Nicholas Amhurst, Henry, Viscount Bolingbroke, and William Pulteney, Earl of Bath]

Date: 1728

"F. Mallebranch, with the Spirit of a Cartesian, denies that a Man who thinks seriously on the Matter, can doubt but the Essence of the Mind consists altogether in Thought, as that of Matter does in Extension; and that according to the various modifications of Thought,...

— Chambers, Ephraim (1680-1740)

Date: 1728

"'Tis pleasant to trace the Mind bundling up its Ideas, and giving Names to the several Parcels; to observe, for instance, how it proceeds from the simple Idea, Thinking, to the more complex one, Knowledge, thence to the more complex, a Science, thence farther to Scientifical, &c."

— Chambers, Ephraim (1680?–1740)

Date: 1728

"Observe by the way, That all the Organs consist of little Threads, or Nerves; which have their Origine in the Middle of the Brain, are diffused thence throughout all the Members which have any Sense, and terminate in the exterior Parts of the Body: That when we are in Health, and awake, one End ...

— Chambers, Ephraim (1680?–1740)

Date: 1729

"Secondly, 'Tis just matter of wonder & astonishment that ever one spark of faith was kindled in such an heart as thine is; [end page 124] an heart which had no predisposition or inclination in the least to believe; yea, it was not rasa tabula, like clean paper, void of any impression of f...

— Flavell, John (bap. 1630, d. 1691)

Date: April 30, 1730

"The spirit of the brain, distilled by the heat of the imagination, like some chemical preparations, when exposed to the air, is apt to smoke, to take fire, to crack, and bounce, to the no small disturbance of the neighbourhood."

— Richard Russel and John Martyn

Date: April 30, 1730

"Nay, the very insipid phlegm, and even the caput mortuum of the brain, after this chemical operation, being mixed with ink, and spred upon paper, have the same combustible, noisy qualities, with the spirits themselves."

— Richard Russel and John Martyn

Date: 1730

"As the memory relieves the mind in her vacant moments, and prevents any chasms of thought by ideas of what is past, we have other faculties that agitate and employ her upon what is to come."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: 1731

"It must needs follow from hence, that Knowledge is an Inward and Active Energy of the Mind it self, and the displaying of its own Innate Vigour from within, whereby it doth Conquer, Master and Command its Objects, and so begets a Clear, Serene, Victorious, and Satisfactory Sense within it self."

— Cudworth, Ralph (1617-1688)