Romantic Poets and the Purification of the Imagination

Thinking about Christianity and creativity caused me to think of a class I took two quarters ago on the philosophy and poetry of the Romantic literary era. An absolutely fascinating subject. Many of the Romantic poets wrote in reaction to the mechanical and “unnatural” empiricism that resulted in the Industrial Age of that era. These poets stressed for the purification of the imagination – a purification of what it is that the “eye” sees. A trading of the artificial image for the sublime and beautiful. Many of the Romantic poets were not believers. Some were. Not all. But, a reoccurring theme within much of the poetry from the Romantic era is the purification of the imagination to see the divine within the ordinary.

In his “Expostulation and Reply” of the “Lyrical Ballads,” the Romantic poet William Wordsworth writes: “The eye it cannot choose but see.” Earlier within this same literary period, William Blake writes in a letter addressed to the Reverend John Trusler: “… but everybody does not see alike… As a man is, so he sees; as the eye is formed, such are its powers.” For the Romantic poet, the understanding of visualization and the act of perception is a central theme within poetry and art. It is the Romantic that began to understand that the act of “seeing” transcends merely that which the eye physically “sees.” Rather, it is through the lens of aesthetics and ethics, and the intellectual, social, historical, and economical modes of perception that one constructs his or her understanding of perception on a daily basis. It is the understanding and consciousness one brings to the examination of an object that determines the interpretation of that object. For the Romantic, it is “as the eye is formed” that there is an objective “usurpation” of the imagination that allows the Romantic to see transcendental “visions of eternity” (Blake, Wordsworth). This understanding of the relationship between the eye and the imagination is one of the most important and fundamental concepts of the Romantic Era.

The forming of the “eye” is essential to the imagination. The Romantic understanding of the “eye” is synonymous with the Romantic understanding of the imagination. For, the eye is the window of the imagination. It is this understanding that prompts William Wordsworth to write in Book VI of The Thirteen-Book Prelude: “Imagination! lifting up itself / Before the eye.” If “everybody does not see alike” as Blake writes, than what it is that one perceives determines the imagination. Thus, “as the eye is formed, such are its powers” becomes an integral Romantic concept. For, according to the Romantic artists, to those who have an appreciation for the expression of aesthetics and content as an effect of imagination, “this world is a world of imagination and vision” (Blake). Echoing the words of the “Gospel of Matthew,” Samuel Taylor Coleridge writes in his Biographia Literaria: “we have eyes but see not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand.” And, in “A Memorable Fancy” of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Blake writes:

if the doors of perception were cleansed / everything would appear to man as it is, in- / -finite – / For man has closed himself up, till he sees / all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.

For the Romantic, the “weak” man does not cleanse “the doors [of his] perception,” but rather, perceives through the “film of familiarity” and has an “unworthy eye” as well as “dull senses” and views. As the “film of familiarity” covers the eye “as the eye is formed,” the “powers” of the eye are indeed limited as the senses are dull to the imaginative world (Coleridge, Blake). That is, the creative world and visions of eternity.
Important for the Romantic poet is the understanding of this active relationship between the eye and the imagination. The world of the imagination and vision is available to those whose “formed” eyes are like those of the Romantic poets – able to see the infinite in the finite. It is this “formed” eye that allows the Romantics to “see” transcendental “visions of eternity” (Blake). The objective metaphysics and epistemology of the “formed” eye causes these poets to direct their conscious imaginations to see “visions of eternity.” The role of innocence and pure vision is also crucial to the “formed” eye, as it is this purity of imaginative vision which allows the Romantics to “see” fantastic sights with the “inward eye” (Wordsworth). Also, the “usurpation” of memories by the imagination is a significant transformation in the interpretation of perception. It is the awareness of this intimate relationship between the eye and the imagination that leads William Blake to write in A Vision of the Last Judgment:

assert for My Self that I do not behold the outward Creation & that to me it is a hindrance & not Action; it is as the Dirt upon my feet, No part of Me. "What," it will be Questiond, "When the Sun rises do you not see a round disk of fire somewhat like a Guinea?" O no, no, I see an Innumerable company of the Heavenly host crying "Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty." I question not my Corporeal or Vegetative Eye any more than I would Question a Window concerning a Sight: I look thro it & not with it. (Blake)

Yet, how does this purification of the imagination, and its resulting creativity occur? By gazing into the face of Jesus. The Psalmist cried, “To all perfection I see a limit; but Your commands are boundless” (Psalm 119:96). And, in my all-time favorite definition of worship, the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple once said:

“Worship is the submission of all of our nature to God.
It is the quickening of consciousness by His Holiness,
Nourishment of mind by His truth,
Purifying of imagination by His beauty,
Opening of the heart to His love,
And submission of will to His purpose.
And all of this gathered up in adoration is the greatest of human expressions of which we are capable.”

Worship. Delighting oneself in the Word of God. Gazing into the face of Jesus. And, by doing so, allowing the All-Creative God to infuse one’s soul with His creativity. It is a reflection of Him. It is an act of worship unto Him. And, ultimately, it is to bring Him glory.