ude rugged
uncouth style" by suggesting that sweet verses avoid telling important
truths; harshness and obscurity may at least remind one that there is a
significance beyond mere words. His lament is characteristic: "How ill
alas! with wisdome it accords/ To sell my living sense for liveless
words."

In spite of these downcast complaints, More was quite capable of lively
and meaningful poetic ideas. One is the striking image of the cone which
occurs in _Democritus Platonissans_ (especially in stanzas 7-8, 66-67,
and 88) and becomes the most essential symbol to More's expression
of infinitude and extension. The figure first appears in
_Antipsychopannychia_ (II.9) where his purpose is to reconcile the world
Soul with Christian eschatology. In _Democritus Platonissans_, the cone
enables More to adapt the familiar Hermetic paradox:

A Circle whose circumference no where
Is circumscrib'd, whose Centre's each where set,
But the low Cusp's a figure circular,
Whose compasse is ybound, but centre's every where. (st. 8)

Every point on the circumference, or base of the cone, relates to the
single point at the top. The world, More wants to say, has no limits, no
center, yet there are bounds in its not having any. More recognizes the
contradiction when he fancies "some strong arm'd Archer" at the wide
world's edge (st. 37). Where shall he send his shafts? Into "mere
vacuity"? But More hardly seems aware of the inappropriateness of the
cone: he uses a geometrical figure to locate space, time, and numberless
worlds within the universal sight of God, but matter is infinite,
"distinct/ And yet proceeding from the Deitie" (st. 68). Obviously, the
archer must forever be sending his arrows through an infinitely
expanding surface. Nevertheless, the cone has great value as a metaphor,
as a richly suggestive and fascinating conception. More, however, does
not want to speak metaphorically; he is attempting to disclose truths,
literal and plain, where pretty words and metaphors have no place. Even
as he is writing his most effective poetry, we are aware that More is
denying his poetic office; for he is pleading a reasoned case where the
words crack and strain, where poetic meaning gathers, only to be denied.

But these objections momentarily disappear when More forgets himself
enough to let us feel his imagination and does not worry that we might
miss the proofs of his philosophy. _Democritus Platonissans_ concludes
with an