"After a weak mind has been duly prepared, and turned as it were, by opening a sluice or torrent of high-sounding words, the greater the contradiction proposed the stronger impression it makes, because it increases the puzzle, and lays fast hold on the admiration; depositing the small proportion of reason with which it was before impregnated, like the vitriol acid in the copper-mines of Wicklow, into which if you immerse iron, it immediately quits the copper which it had before dissolved, and unites with the other metal, to which it has a stronger attraction"
The History and Adventures of an Atom
7 entries in the ESTC (1769, 1786, 1795, 1797, 1799).<br>
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Tobias Smollett, <u>The History and Adventures of an Atom</u>, 2 vols. (London: Robinson and Roberts, 1769). &lt;<a href="http://find.galegroup.com/ecco/infomark.do?&source=gale&prodId=ECCO&userGroupName=viva_uva&tabID=T001&docId=CW111569721&type=multipage&contentSet=ECCOArticles&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE">Link to ECCO</a>&gt;