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Date: September 10, 1836

"In my utter impotence to test the authenticity of the report of my senses, to know whether the impressions they make on me correspond with outlying objects, what difference does it make, whether Orion is up there in heaven, or some god paints the image in the firmament of the soul?"

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: September 10, 1836

"Whether nature enjoy a substantial existence without, or is only in the apocalypse of the mind, it is alike useful and alike venerable to me."

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: September 10, 1836

"The first effort of thought tends to relax this despotism of the senses, which binds us to nature as if we were a part of it, and shows us nature aloof, and, as it were, afloat."

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: September 10, 1836

"When the eye of Reason opens, to outline and surface are at once added, grace and expression."

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: September 10, 1836

"Whilst we wait in this Olympus of gods, we think of nature as an appendix to the soul."

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: September 10, 1836

"These are examples of Reason’s momentary grasp of the sceptre; the exertions of a power which exists not in time or space, but an instantaneous in-streaming causing power."

— Emerson, Ralph Waldo (1803-1882)

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Date: 1841

"It is the solar system of the mind."

— Marx, Karl (1818-1883)

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Date: 1842

"The images of past delight / Have fleeted from her troubled sight, / And left no perfect form behind / On the dim mirror of the mind"

— Herbert, William (1778-1847)

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The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.