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Gentleman's Magazine 1842 part 1 p.8
deserve an appropiate name, and, for this purpose, the word
FANCY would appear to be the best that our language
affords."
"According to the explanation (he proceeds) which has now
been given of the word FANCY, the office of this power is to
collect materials for the imagination; and
thus the latter power presupposes the former, while the
former does not necessarily suppose the latter.
"A man whose habits of association present to him, for
illustrating or embellishing a subject, a number of
resembling or of analogous ideas, we call a man of FANCY;
but for an effort of imagination, various
other powers are necessary, particularly the powers of taste
and of judgment; without which, we can produce nothing that
will be a source of pleasure to others. It is the power of
fancy which supplies the poet with the metaphorical
language, and with all the analogies which are the
foundation of his allusions; but it is the power of
imagination that creates the complex scenes he
describes, and the fictitious characters he delineates. To
fancy, we apply the epithets of rich and luxuriant:
to imagination, those of beautiful or
sublime."*
As regards this application of epithets, it may be very
reasonably asked, may they not be interchanged? Is not the
imagination of Thomson rich and luxuriant? Is not the fancy
of Collins beautiful and sublime? And if these queries be
answered in the affirmative, what becomes of this [l]aboured
effort at distinction?
Mr. Stewart's meaning, however, requires illustration: and a
poet of his own country shall supply it.
"Yet such the destiny of all on earth:
So flourishes and fades majestic man;
Fair is the bud his vernal morn puts forth;
And fost'ring gales awhile the nursling fan:
O smile, ye heavens, serene:- ye mildews wan,
Ye blighting whirlwinds, spare his balmy prime,
Nor lessen of his life the little span!
Borne on the swift, though silent wings of Time,
Old Age comes on apace to ravage all the clime."
Minstrel, st. 2.
According to Mr. Stewart's interpretation of nature, it is
the office of fancy to collect materials for the
imagination, to supply the analogies that are the
foundations of his allusions, and also to supply the
language.
In the above poetic pourtraiture, then, we find man and his
destiny, vegetable nature and its destiny, to be the
materials which fancy has collected: the analogy
between the two, as being both exposed to sudden and
resistless destruction, was supplied by fancy; and by
fancy also the language. What is wanting to the
completion of the picture? the scenes or materials (for what
are the materials but the scenes?) are created, and are
delineated and described by fancy. What then is left
for imagination to perform? her aid may be dispensed
with as superfluous. And yet Mr. Stewart insists that it is
she who created the scenes.
Other objections present themselves against the views of Mr.
Stewart; but the above will probably be deemed sufficient:
for, unless distinctions of this kind are clear and
determinate, they are worse than nugatory. We must proceed
therefore to the Author of the Synonyms; who writes thus:
"A man has IMAGINATION, in proportion as he can distinctly
copy in idea the impressions of sense; it is the faculty
which images to the mind the phenomena of sensation. A man
has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect,
or associate, at pleasure, these internal images,
(φανταςειν
is to cause to appear,) so as to complete ideal
representations of absent
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