monarch, rather than to that of
the poet; and it is that, which of all others, would have been the most
likely to occur at the time; in this point of view it has high
imaginative propriety. Of the same fanciful character is that
transformation of the tree trunks into dragons noticed before in
Turner's Jason; and in the same way this becomes imaginative as it
exhibits the effect of fear in disposing to morbid perception. Compare
with it the real and high action of the imagination on the same matter
in Wordsworth's Yew trees (which I consider the most vigorous and solemn
bit of forest landscape ever painted):--

"Each particular trunk a growth
Of intertwisted fibres serpentine,
Up coiling and inveterately convolved,
_Nor uninformed with Phantasy, and looks
That threaten the profane_."

It is too long to quote, but the reader should refer to it: let him note
especially, if painter, that pure touch of color, "by sheddings from the
pining umbrage tinged."

In the same way, the blasted trunk on the left, in Turner's drawing of
the spot where Harold fell at the battle of Hastings, takes, where its
boughs first separate, the shape of the head of an arrow; this, which is
mere fancy in itself, is imagination as it supposes in the spectator an
excited condition of feeling dependent on the history of the spot.

Sec. 7. Morbid or nervous fancy.

I have been led perhaps into too great detail in illustrating these
points; but I think it is of no small importance to prove how in all
cases the imagination is based upon, and appeals to, a deep heart
feeling; and how faithful and earnest it is in contemplation of the
subject matter, never losing sight of it, or disguising it, but
depriving it of extraneous and material accidents, and regarding it in
its disembodied essence. I have not, however, sufficiently noted in
opposition to it, that diseased action of the fancy which depends more
on nervous temperament than intellectual power; and which, as in
dreaming, fever, insanity, and other morbid conditions of mind is
frequently a source of daring and inventive conception; and so the
visionary appearances resulting from various disturbances of the frame
by passion, and from the rapid tendency of the mind to invest with shape
and intelligence the active influences about it, as in the various
demons, spirits, and fairies of all imaginative nations; which, however