Date: 1711

"And reflecting on what is transacted within us, it seems to me a very diverting Scene to think when we strive to recollect something that does not then occur; how nimbly those volatil Messengers of ours will beat through all the Paths, and hunt every Enclosure of the Organ set aside for thinking...

— Mandeville, Bernard (bap. 1670, d. 1733)

Date: Saturday, June 28, 1712

"By this means they awaken other Ideas of the same Sett, which immediately determine a new Dispatch of Spirits, that in the same manner open other Neighbouring Traces, till at last the whole Sett of them is blown up, and the whole Prospect or Garden flourishes in the Imagination."

— Addison, Joseph (1672-1719)

Date: September 17, 1726

"This Train of Images continually revolv'd in our young Parson's Brain; and to preserve them from being jostled out by any intruding Foreigners, who might dispossess the Original Orthodox Inhabitants, the first Link of the Chain was rivetted by Pride, and the two last closed up by those two insep...

— Arbuckle, James (d. 1742)

Date: 1733

"May not the sentient Principle have its Seat in some Place in the Brain, where the Nerves terminate, like the Musician shut up in his Organ-Room? May not the infinite Windings, Convolutions, and Complications of the Beginning of the Nerves which constitute the Brain, serve to d...

— Cheyne, George (1671-1743)

Date: 1785

"[W]hen the mind is absent, and the thoughts are wandering to something else than what is passing in the place in which we are, we are often miserable"

— Paley, William (1743-1805)