Date: Wednesday, October 31, 1711

"You have, in my Opinion, raised a good presumptive Argument from the increasing Appetite the Mind has to Knowledge, and to the extending its own Faculties, which cannot be accomplished, as the more restrained Perfection of lower Creatures may, in the Limits of a short Life."

— Hughes, John (1678?-1720)

Date: 1718

"Our faithful Censor laid asleep within, / We undisturb'd take down full Draughts of Sin."

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1718

"And now the fair Ideas, which possest / Your Mind, by loose and vicious Thoughts opprest, / How will you wing your Way to Realms above, / And feast your Soul with Extasies of Love"

— Blackmore, Sir Richard (1654-1729)

Date: 1745

"Drink early then, my Friend, at Reason's Bowl, / And fill with wholesome Draughts thy youthful Soul. / If Wine or Gall the Recent Vessel stains, / Each Scent alike the faithful Cask retains."

— Whaley, John (bap. 1710, d. 1745)

Date: 1768

"But there is no nation under heaven abounding with more variety of learning--where the sciences may be more fitly woo'd, or more surely won than here--where art is encouraged, and will so soon rise high--where Nature (take her all together) has so little to answer for--and, to close all, where t...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: December 14, 1770; 1771

"The mind requires nourishment adapted to its growth; and what may have promoted our earlier efforts, might retard us in our nearer approaches to perfection."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1776; 1777

"The natural appetite or taste of the human mind is for Truth; whether that truth results from the real agreement or equality of original ideas among themselves; from the agreement of the representation of any object with the thing represented; or from the correspondence of the several parts of a...

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)

Date: December 10, 1784; 1785

"The daily food and nourishment of the mind of an Artist is found in the great works of his predecessors."

— Reynolds, Joshua (1723-1792)