work_id,theme,provenance,created_at,text,reviewed_on,id,comments,metaphor,dictionary,updated_at,context
7498,"","Searching in C-H Lion. Found again reading Sean Silver, The Mind is a Collection: Case Studies in Eighteenth-Century Thought (Philadelphia: Penn Press, 2015), 3.",2013-07-01 16:45:42 UTC,"Imagination is that faculty whereby the mind not only reflects on its own operations, but which assembles the various ideas conveyed to the understanding by the canal of sensation, and treasured up in the repository of the memory, compounding or disjoining them at pleasure; and which, by its plastic power of inventing new associations of ideas, and of combining them with infinite variety, is enabled to present a creation of its own, and to exhibit scenes and objects which never existed in nature. So indispensibly necessary is this faculty in the composition of Genius, that all the discoveries in science, and all the inventions and improvements in art, if we except such as have arisen from mere accident, derive their origin from its vigorous exertion. At the same time it must be confessed, that all the false and fallacious systems of the former, and all the irregular and illegitimate performances in the latter, which have ever been obtruded upon mankind, may be justly imputed to the unbounded extravagance of the same faculty: such effects are the natural consequences of an exuberant imagination, without any proportionable share of the reasoning talent. It is evidently necessary therefore, in order to render the productions of Genius regular and just, as well as elegant and ingenious, that the discerning and coercive power of judgment should mark and restrain the excursions of a wanton imagination; in other words, that the austerity of reason should blend itself with the gaiety of the graces. Here then we have another ingredient of Genius; an ingredient essential to its constitution, and without which it cannot possibly be exhibited to full advantage, even an accurate and penetrating JUDGMENT.
(pp. 6-8)",,21354,"","""Imagination is that faculty whereby the mind not only reflects on its own operations, but which assembles the various ideas conveyed to the understanding by the canal of sensation, and treasured up in the repository of the memory, compounding or disjoining them at pleasure; and which, by its plastic power of inventing new associations of ideas, and of combining them with infinite variety, is enabled to present a creation of its own, and to exhibit scenes and objects which never existed in nature.""","",2016-03-11 18:17:29 UTC,""
7771,"",Reading,2013-11-15 17:06:01 UTC,"[...] He took occasion at the same time to extol the liberty which they enjoyed in their retreat, their manner of living, free from envy and ambition; their safety, ease, and happiness, with all the virtues that accompanied it, proved how consonant it was with true philosophy, that such a life alone could preserve pure and untainted morality, and highly became the good and virtuous, who knew how to despise riches, and live according to the dictates of nature. For those, indeed, who are in search of wealth, who measure happiness by power and splendour, who have never tasted of liberty, enjoyed the open freedom of speech, or beheld the face of truth; but have been brought up to, and for ever conversant with servitude and flattery: for those who are given up to pleasure, fond of luxurious tables, wine, and women; full of fraud, treachery, and lying; who attend to the sound of the harp, and listen with delight to lascivious sonnets; for such men the city alone is the proper habitation; where every street and market-place is full of enjoyments; there pleasure enters in at every gate: through the eye, the ear, the taste, the smell; through every part and every sense she gains admittance, and not a path remains that is not widened by this rapid and ever-flowing torrent. There meet together, adultery, avarice, perjury, and every other vice; the soul is overwhelmed beneath them, and justice, modesty, and virtue are no more: bereft of these, the mind becomes dry and barren, or only teems with savage and brutal extravagance. Such, according to his description, is this great city, and such the lessons of instruction to be learned from her. [...]
(p. 19)",,23197,"","""For such men the city alone is the proper habitation; where every street and market-place is full of enjoyments; there pleasure enters in at every gate: through the eye, the ear, the taste, the smell; through every part and every sense she gains admittance, and not a path remains that is not widened by this rapid and ever-flowing torrent.""",Inhabitants,2013-11-15 17:06:01 UTC,""