Date: 1791

"Again, when he uses the metaphor of white paper, &c. he marks very clearly, by the terms (as we [end page 68] say that it is not strict philosophical language, but designed as an elucidation of the subject, addressed through the medium of the senses, to the conceptions of the world in general."

— Thomas, Daniel (b. 1748)

Date: February 1791

"Call to mind the sentiments which nature has engraved on the heart of every citizen, and which take a new force when they are solemnly recognised by all."

— Paine, Thomas (1737-1809)

Date: 1792

"The understanding, it is true, may keep us from going out of drawing when we group our thoughts, or transcribe from the imagination and warm sketches of fancy; but the animal spirits, the individual character, give the colouring."

— Wollstonecraft, Mary (1759-1797)

Date: 1792

"For any kind of reading, I think better than leaving a blank still blank, because the mind must receive a degree of enlargement and obtain a little strength by a slight exertion of its thinking powers."

— Wollstonecraft, Mary (1759-1797)

Date: 1793

"Such is the natural imbecility of the human mind, it confines us to the immediate scenes in which we are engaged, and as new objects present the past is in a degree erased from recollection."

— Anonymous [By an American Lady]

Date: 1794

"Therefore I take the mind or soul of men to be so perfectly indifferent to receive all impressions, as a rasa tabula, or white paper, &c."

— Morell, Thomas (1703-1784)

Date: 1794

"The mind is not a rasa tabula, though, at the same time, it must be allowed, we gain no actual knowledge of the latent ideas which it possesses, but as they are awakened by reflection and experience."

— Sullivan, Richard Joseph, Sir (1752-1806)

Date: 1794

"The rasa tabula will not allow us to have mental ideas."

— Sullivan, Richard Joseph, Sir (1752-1806)

Date: 1795

"A soft sponginess of character that will easily acquire any hue, or any stain; a tabula rasa of intellect; a spirit invulnerable to insult; that (for example) after vain endeavors to disunite and discourage the Catholics of Ireland, could condescend to [end page 2] truck and chaffer, for the off...

— Drennan, William (1754-1820)

Date: 1795

"The infant mind has been compared to a tabula rasa, or sheet of clean paper: but there is this essential difference, as hath been well observed, between the opposite objects of comparison they are not both equally Indifferent to the inscription which they are to bear."

— Napleton, John (1738/9-1817)