; secondly, as analytic or penetrative; thirdly,
as regardant or contemplative.
FOOTNOTES
[49] He continues thus, "To illustrate these observations, let us
consider the steps by which Milton must have proceeded, in creating
his imaginary garden of Eden. When he first proposed to himself that
subject of description, it is reasonable to suppose that a variety
of the most striking scenes which he had seen, crowded into his
mind. The association of ideas suggested them and the power of
conception placed each of them before him with all its beauties and
imperfections. In every natural scene, if we destine it for any
particular purpose, there are defects and redundancies, which art
may sometimes, but cannot always correct. But the power of
imagination is unlimited. She can create and annihilate, and dispose
at pleasure her woods, her rocks, and her rivers. Milton,
accordingly, would not copy his Eden from any one scene, but would
select from each the features which were most eminently beautiful.
The power of abstraction enabled him to make the separation, and
taste directed him in the selection."
CHAPTER II.
OF IMAGINATION ASSOCIATIVE.
Sec. 1. Of simple conception.
In order to render our inquiry as easy as possible, we shall consider
the dealing of the associative imagination with the simplest possible
matter, that is,--with conceptions of material things. First, therefore,
we must define the nature of these conceptions themselves.
After beholding and examining any material object, our knowledge
respecting it exists in two different forms. Some facts exist in the
brain in a verbal form, as known, but not conceived, as, for instance,
that it was heavy or light, that it was eight inches and a quarter long,
etc., of which length we cannot have accurate conception, but only such
a conception as might attach to a length of seven inches or nine; and
which fact we may recollect without any conception of the object at all.
Other facts respecting it exist in the brain in a visible form, not
always visible, but voluntarily visible, as its being white, or having
such and such a complicated shape, as the form of a rose-bud, for
instance, which it would be difficult to express verbally, neither is it
retained by the brain in a verbal form, but a visible one, that is, when
we wish for knowledge of its fo
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