CHAPTER III - OF IMAGINATION PENETRATIVE

Summary

Imagination penetrative is concerned, not with the combining, but the apprehending of things

Thus far we have been defining that combining operation of the Imagination, which appears to be in a sort mechanical, yet takes place in the same inexplicable modes, whatever be the order of conception submitted to it, though I choose to illustrate it by its dealings with mere matter before taking cognizance of any nobler subjects of imagery. We must now examine the dealing of the Imagination with its separate conceptions, and endeavour to understand, not only its principles of selection, but its modes of apprehension with respect to what it selects.

Milton's and Dante's description of flame

When Milton's Satan first “rears from off the pool his mighty stature,” the image of leviathan before suggested not being yet abandoned, the effect on the fire-wave is described as of the upheaved monster on the ocean-stream.”

“On each hand the flames

Driven backward, slope their pointed spires, and, rolled

In billows, leave i' the midst a horrid vale.”

And then follows a fiercely restless piece of volcanic imagery:

“As when the force

Of subterranean wind transports a hill

Torn from Pelorus, or the shattered side

Of thundering Ætna, whose combustible

And fuelled entrails, thence conceiving fire,

Sublimed with mineral fury, aid the winds,

And leave a singed bottom all involved

With stench and smoke: such resting found the sole

Of unblest feet.”