Date: 1770

"It is a favourite maxim with Mr LOCKE, as it was with some ancient philosophers, that the human soul, previous to education, is like a piece of white paper, or tabula rasa, and this simile, harmless as it may appear, betrays our great modern into several important mistakes."

— Beattie, James (1735-1803)

Date: January 30, 1770, 1771

"I prove it thus: The mind has no doubt a faculty of comparing objects or ideas; but it is found invariably to judge and act from a preponderancy to that action or opinion which is the most suited to yield it satisfaction present or future: but if this preponderancy depends entirely on the organi...

— Author Unknown

Date: 1770

"That the mind of man, previous to the information of the senses, is a tabula rasa, a blank, without ideas, without knowledge, is a doctrine too well supported by this great master of reason to suffer a shock."

— Baker, William (1742-1785)

Date: 1771

"As the Wax would not be adequate to its business of Signature, had it not a Power to retain, as well as to receive; the same holds of the SOUL, with respect to Sense and Imagination."

— Harris, James (1709-1780)

Date: 1771

"For were that mind, what some suppose, a mere tabula rasa upon its first coming into the world, a pure and perfect blank, without one single impression; who can deny that it would be right, that it would be humane and wise, to make, in the earliest moments, those impressions upon it, whic...

— Dodd, William (1729-1777)

Date: 1771

"The infant mind at coming to the world, is a meer rasa tabula, destitute of all ideas and materials of reflection."

— Usher, James (1720-1771)

Date: 1771

"It is a charte blanche, ready for receiving the inscriptions of sense; yet it behoves us carefully to observe, that it differs from a rasa tabula or a sheet of clean paper, in the following respect, that you may write on clean paper; that sugar is bitter, wormwood sweet, fire and f...

— Usher, James (1720-1771)

Date: 1773

"Though you are so happy as to have parents, who are both capable and desirous of giving you all proper instruction, yet I, who love you so tenderly, cannot help fondly wishing to contribute something, if possible, to your improvement and welfare: and, as I am so far separated from you, that it i...

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: 1773

"The great laws of morality are indeed written in our hearts, and may be discovered by reason: but our reason is of slow growth, very unequally dispensed to different persons, liable to error, and confined within very narrow limits in all."

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)

Date: 1773

"With respect to all these, the best direction that can be given is to fix on some periods or epochas, which, by being often mentioned and thought of, explained and referred to, will at last be so deeply engraven on the memory, that they will be ready to present themselves whenever you call for t...

— Mulso [later Chapone], Hester (1727-1801)