Date: 1690, 1694, 1695, 1700, 1706

"Would the pictures coming into such a dark room but stay there, and lie so orderly as to be found upon occasion, it would very much resemble the understanding of a man, in reference to all objects of sight, and the ideas of them"

— Locke, John (1632-1704)

Date: 1699

"We do plainly perceive that our Bodies are clogs to our Minds: And all the use that even the purest sort of Body in an Estate conceived to be glorified, can be of to a Mind, is to be an Instrument of local Motion, or to be a repository of Ideas for Memory and Imagination."

— Burnet, Gilbert (1643-1715)

Date: 1708, 1714

"'Twas a sign that this Philosopher believ'd there was a good Stock of Visionary Spirit originally in Human Nature."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1708, 1714

"Something there will be of Extravagance and Fury, when the Ideas or Images receiv'd are too big for the narrow human Vessel to contain."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1709, 1714

"They may perhaps be Monsters, and not Divinitys, or Sacred Truths, which are kept thus choicely, in some dark Corner of our Minds: The Specters may impose on us, whilst we refuse to turn 'em every way, and view their Shapes and Complexions in every light."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: Saturday, May 7, to Tuesday, May 10, 1709

"The next, as I said, I went to was a common swearer: never was creature so puzzled as myself when I came first to view his brain; half of it was worn out, and filled up with mere expletives, that had nothing to do with any other parts of the texture."

— Steele, Sir Richard (1672-1729)

Date: Saturday, May 7, to Tuesday, May 10, 1709

"When we first take our place about a man, the receptacles of the pericranium are immediately searched. In his, I found no one ordinary trace of thinking; but strong passion, violent desires, and a continued series of different changes, had torn it to pieces."

— Steele, Sir Richard (1672-1729)

Date: 1710, 1714

"There is no way of estimating manners or apprising the different humours, fancies, passions, and apprehensions of others without first taking an inventory of the same kind of goods within ourselves and surveying our domestic fund."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"For without this Understanding, the Historian's Judgment will be very defective; the Politician's Views very narrow, and chimerical; and the Poet's Brain, however stock'd with Fiction, will be but poorly furnish'd; as in the sequel we shall make appear."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)

Date: 1710, 1714

"There is no way of estimating Manners, or apprizing the different Humours, Fancys, Passions and Apprehensions of others, without first taking an Inventory of the same kind of Goods within ourselves, and surveying our domestick Fund."

— Cooper, Anthony Ashley, third earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713)