work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
4725,Blank Slate,"Searching ""tabula rasa"" in ECCO",2006-10-10 00:00:00 UTC,"[...] Socrates, and other ancients, seem to have had particular pleasure in running a parallel between agriculture and the improvement of the mind: But in no respect does the comparison or likeness hold more exactly than in this, that as the ground must be properly prepared for the reception and nourishment of good seed, so the mind must by apposite care be moulded into a fit temperament or disposition for embracing and cherishing the seeds of good doctrine. In both cases, the first or previous care is of the greatest moment. Instruction will be but thrown away, it cannot sink into the mind, or take firm root there, so as to fructify, if the mind be not pure and clean, pliable, or docile and open to truth and knowledge, but will quickly be chocked by the opposite illiberal temperature. The human mind cannot continue long quite a tabula rasa; some images must of course be gaining upon its affections, and consequently, forming some propensities or habits. And we may leave it to any thinking person, who is acquainted with the world, and has but reflected, that reason must be artfully invited and drawn forth into action, and [end page 216] requires much culture in order to ripen and strengthen it, whereas our senses, from the first dawn of life, are continually assailed by outward objects, and speedily rush up to maturity. [...]
(pp. 216-7)",,12465,"","""The human mind cannot continue long quite a tabula rasa; some images must of course be gaining upon its affections, and consequently, forming some propensities or habits.""",Writing,2009-09-14 19:37:01 UTC,""
4762,Blank Slate,"Searching ""tabula rasa"" in ECCO",2006-10-10 00:00:00 UTC,"[...] We are told by Philosophers, of no small Note, that the Mind is, at first, a kind of Tabula rasa, or like a Piece of blank Paper, that it bears no original Inscriptions, when we come into the World,--that we owe all the Characters afterwards drawn upon it, to the Impressions made upon our Senses; to Education, Custom, and the like. Be that as it will, certain it is, that a human Creature, untaught by Art, and undisciplined by Habit, does, of all other Creatures, lie the most open to Impressions from without, and is the most susceptible of every Form, Habit and Passion. Such a Creature is perceptive, and withal credulous; curious, yet easily imposed on. We have an innate, and almost insuperable Propensity to Imitation, and imbibe Manners as easily as we do Opinions. [...]
(vol I., pp. 114-5)",2010-10-10,12603,"•I've included twice: Tabula Rasa and Paper
•Cross-reference: Passage appears, with slight alterations, in Sir John Fielding's The Universal Mentor (1763","""We are told by Philosophers, of no small Note, that the Mind is, at first, a kind of Tabula rasa, or like a Piece of blank Paper, that it bears no original Inscriptions, when we come into the World,--that we owe all the Characters afterwards drawn upon it, to the Impressions made upon our Senses; to Education, Custom, and the like.""",Writing,2011-10-10 15:58:21 UTC,""
4762,Blank Slate,"Searching ""paper"" in ECCO",2006-10-19 00:00:00 UTC,"I Can hardly think, said Philander, that Eugenio meant to carry the Point so far as to assert, that Education and Culture were entirely unnecessary, or pernicious to Youth. I should only believe he designed to expose some of the ordinary Methods of Education, as too narrow and unsuitable to the free expansive Genius of Nature. As little would I agree with those Philosophers Constant mentioned, that the Mind resembles a Leaf of white Paper. I would rather compare it to a Seed, which contains all the Stamina of the future Plant, and all those Principles of Perfection, to which it aspires in its After-growth, and regularly arrives by gradual Stages, unless it is obstructed in its Progress by external Violence. Our Minds, in like manner, are completely organized, if I may say so, at first; they want no Powers, no Capacities of Perception, no Instincts or Affections that are essential to their Nature; but these are, in a manner locked up, and are purposely left rude and unfinished, that Prudence, Industry and Virtue, may have full scope in unfolding, raising them up, and bringing them to Maturity. 'Tis he Business of Education, therefore, like a second Creation, to improve nature, to give Form, and Proportion, and Comeliness to those unwrought Materials. And, in my Opinion, we have as much need of the Hand of Culture to call forth our latent Powers, to direct their Exercise; in fine, to shape and polish us into Men, as the unformed Block has of the Craver or Statuary's Skill, to draw it out of that rude State, into the Form and Proportions of a Venus of Medicis, or an Olympian Jupiter. [...]
(vol I, pp. 116-7)",2010-10-10,12605,"","""As little would I agree with those Philosophers Constant mentioned, that the Mind resembles a Leaf of white Paper.""",Writing,2011-10-10 15:59:17 UTC,Dialogue IV
4802,"","Searching ""mind"" in Liberty Fund OLL",2005-08-18 00:00:00 UTC,"From the whole, we may conclude, that the Nature, the Reasons, and the Relations of things would never have suggested to us this simple Idea of Moral Obligation without a proper Sense susceptible of it. It is interwoven with the very Frame and Constitution of our Nature, and by it We are in the strictest Sense a La w to Ourselves. Nor is it left to us to trace out this Law by the cool or slow Deductions of Reason; far less is this Law the Result of subtile and metaphysical Enquiries into the abstract Natures and Relations of Things; we need not ascend to Heaven to bring it down from thence, nor descend into the Depths to seek it there; it is within us, ever present with us, ever active and incumbent on the Mind, and engraven on the Heart in the fair and large Signatures of Conscience, Natural Affection, Compassion, Gratitude, and universal Benevolence.
(p. 40)",2011-10-10,12779,•I've included thrice: Law and Writing and Engraving,"The law ""is within us, ever present with us, ever active and incumbent on the Mind, and engraven on the Heart in the fair and large Signatures of Conscience, Natural Affection, Compassion, Gratitude, and universal Benevolence.""",Court and Writing,2011-10-10 16:05:58 UTC,Book I. Conclusion
4802,"","Searching ""mind"" in Liberty Fund OLL",2005-08-18 00:00:00 UTC,"A very slight Inspection into human Nature suggests to us, that no kind of Objects make so powerful an Impression on us as those which are immediately impressed on our Senses, or strongly painted on our Imaginations. Whatever is purely Intellectual, as abstracted or scientific Truths, the subtile Relations and Differences of Things, has a fainter sort of Existence in the Mind; and though it may exercise and whet the Memory, the Judgment, or the Reasoning Powers, gives hardly any Impulse at all to the Active Powers, the Passions, which are the main Springs of Motion. On the other hand, were the Mind entirely under the Direction of Sense, and impressible only by such Objects as are present, and strike some of the outward Organs, we should then be precisely in the State of the Brute-Creation, and be governed solely by Instinct or Appetite, and have no Power to controul whatever Impressions are made upon us: Nature has therefore endued us with a MIDDLE FACULTY, wonderfully adapted to our MIXED State, which holds partly of Sense and partly of Reason, being strongly allied to the former, and the common Receptacle in which all the Notices that come from that quarter are treasured up, and yet greatly subservient and ministerial to the latter, by giving a Body, a Coherence, and Beauty to its Conceptions. This middle Faculty is called the IMAGINATION, one of the most busy and fruitful Powers of the Mind. Into this common Storehouse are likewise carried all those Moral Images or Forms which are derived from our Moral Faculties of Perception, and there they often undergo new Changes and Appearances, by being mixed and wrought up with the Images and Forms of Sensible or Natural Things. By this Coalition of Imagery, Natural Beauty is dignified and heightened by Moral Qualities and Perfections, and Moral Qualities are at once exhibited, and set off by Natural Beauty. The sensible Beauty, or Good, is refined from its Dross by partaking of the Moral, and the Moral receives a Stamp, a visible Character and Currency from the Sensible.--But in order to judge of this mutual Influence, it will be proper to give a few Instances of the Process of the Imagination, or of the Energy of the associating Principle.
(p. 123-4)",2011-10-10,12797,"•INTEREST. Rich passage pulls together many diverse metaphors of mind.
•I've included twice: Receptacle and Minister
•Reviewed 2009-03-04","""Nature has therefore endued us with a MIDDLE FACULTY, wonderfully adapted to our MIXED State, which holds partly of Sense and partly of Reason, being strongly allied to the former, and the common Receptacle in which all the Notices that come from that quarter are treasured up, and yet greatly subservient and ministerial to the latter, by giving a Body, a Coherence, and Beauty to its Conceptions.""",Writing,2013-06-11 18:23:08 UTC,Book III.
5042,Blank Slate,"Searching ""tabula rasa"" in ECCO",2006-10-12 00:00:00 UTC,"In page 29: in February last, says the Libeller, a friend of mine was told by one, who, I suppose, had his information from B--r himself, that upon his coming to England he waited upon Bishop Gibson, to acquaint him, that tho' he had left his own religion, he was not yet determined as to the opinions to be substituted in it's stead. What, in the name of wonder, can this driveler mean! Did I wait upon Bishop Gibson to acquaint him that I was a Free-thinker, that my mind was a tabula rasa! In the very next page he tells his readers, that it is one of my talents to accommodate myself to the principles of the company in which I happen to be; and elsewhere, p. 35, that I become all things to all men, that I may gain something. If that be true, and it likewise be true that I waited upon the Bishop to acquaint him that I was a Free-thinker, I must have looked upon his Lordship as a Free-thinker too, and expected him, as such, some preferment in the Church [...]
(p. 96)",,13546,"","""Did I wait upon Bishop Gibson to acquaint him that I was a Free-thinker, that my mind was a tabula rasa!""","",2009-09-14 19:38:41 UTC,""
5501,"",Reading,2005-11-11 00:00:00 UTC,"Keep me, therefore, no longer in this violent constraint. Confine me not within myself; but point out to me those objects and pleasures, which afford the chief enjoyment. But why do I apply to you, proud and ignorant sages, to shew me the road to happiness? Let me consult my own passions and inclinations. In them must I read the dictates of nature; not in your frivolous discourses.
(p. 141)",,14723,"","""Let me consult my own passions and inclinations. In them must I read the dictates of nature; not in your frivolous discourses.""","",2009-09-14 19:41:44 UTC,Essay XV
7123,"",Searching in Google Books,2011-10-26 21:26:09 UTC,"[...] He arrives at this, through the Knowledge he has of the true Medicine. By this Means he is able to ward off whatever may impeach, or hinder, the Animal Functions, or destroy the Temperature of his Nature; by this he is enabled to acquire the Knowledge of whatever God has left within the Cognizance of Man: The first Man knew them by his Reason; but it was this same Reason that blotted them again from his Mind; for having attained to this Kind of natural Knowledge, he began to mingle therewith his own Notions and Ideas. By this Confusion, which was the Effects of a foolish Curiosity, he rendered imperfect even the Work of his Creator; and this Error it is that the Sage labours to redress. The rest of Animals act only by their Instinct, by which they preserve themselves, as at their first Institution, and live as long now, as when the World first began. Man is yet a great deal more perfect; but has he still preserved that Prerogative we mentioned, or has he not lost long ago the glorious Privilege of living a thousand Years, which with so much Care, he should have studied to preserve? This then it is, that the true Sages have retrieved; and, that you may no more be led into Mistakes, let me assure you, that this is the Philosophers Stone, which is not a chimerical Science, as some half-read People fancy, but a Thing solid and sound. On the other hand, it is certainly known but to a few, and indeed it is impossible it should be known to most Part of Mankind, whom Avarice or Debauch destroy, or, whom an impetuous Desire of Life kills.
(pp. 99-100)",,19303,"","""The first Man knew them by his Reason; but it was this same Reason that blotted them again from his Mind; for having attained to this Kind of natural Knowledge, he began to mingle therewith his own Notions and Ideas.""",Writing,2011-10-26 21:26:09 UTC,""
5033,"",Reading,2012-07-28 13:33:25 UTC,"Since, therefore, the mind of man appears of so loose and unsteddy a contexture, that, even at present, when so many persons find an interest in continually employing on it the chissel and the hammer, yet are they not able to engrave theological tenets with any lasting impression; how much more must this have been the case in antient times, when the retainers to the holy function were so much fewer in comparison? No wonder, that the appearances were then very inconsistent, and that men, on some occasions, might seem determined infidels, and enemies to the established religion, without being so in reality; or at least, without knowing their own minds in that particular.
(p. 84)",,19903,"","""Since, therefore, the mind of man appears of so loose and unsteddy a contexture, that, even at present, when so many persons find an interest in continually employing on it the chissel and the hammer, yet are they not able to engrave theological tenets with any lasting impression; how much more must this have been the case in antient times, when the retainers to the holy function were so much fewer in comparison?""",Impressions and Writing,2012-07-28 13:34:19 UTC,""
4803,"","Searching ""testimony"" and ""senses"" in ECCO-TCP",2013-09-09 15:29:13 UTC,"It may, therefore, be a subject worthy of curiosity, to enquire what is the nature of that evidence, which assures us of any real existence and matter of fact, beyond the present testimony of our senses, or the records of our memory. This part of philosophy, it is observable, has been little cultivated, either by the ancients or moderns; and therefore our doubts and errors, in the prosecution of so important an enquiry, may be the more excusable; while we march through such difficult paths, without any guide or direction. They may even prove useful, by exciting curiosity, and destroying that implicit faith and security, which is the bane of all reasoning and free enquiry. The discovery of defects in the common philosophy, if any such there be, will not, I presume, be a discouragement, but rather an incitement, as is usual, to attempt something more full and satisfactory, than has yet been proposed to the public.
(p. 26)",,22700,"","""It may, therefore, be a subject worthy of curiosity, to enquire what is the nature of that evidence, which assures us of any real existence and matter of fact, beyond the present testimony of our senses, or the records of our memory.""",Court,2013-09-09 15:29:13 UTC,""