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"If it were not employed in this, genius must go on like a mere machine, and a person should have no power over it after it were once set in motion."

— Gerard, Alexander (1728-1795)

Author

An Essay on Genius

Place of Publication

London and Edinburgh

Publisher

Printed for W. Strahan, T.Cadell, and W. Creech

Date

1774

Metaphor

"If it were not employed in this, genius must go on like a mere machine, and a person should have no power over it after it were once set in motion."

Metaphor in Context

The voluntary exertion of the memory in recollection, is very analogous to the exercise of imagination in producing a work of genius; for in this exercise, as well as in that exertion, the will has always some concern: it determines the subject, and it is continually employed in choosing the proper tracts of thought. If it were not employed in this, genius must go on like a mere machine, and a person should have no power over it after it were once set in motion. In what manner the will mixes itself with the operations of the imagination, and influences them, may be understood from the account of recollection, which we have now given. Recollection, and the voluntary exercise of imagination, differ chiefly in two things. First, in the end proposed, We properly recollect, when all that we desire, is to recal to memory something which we have observed: and in recalling it, we are often assisted by fancy; for we may be led to it, not only by its observed connexions with other things, but also by any relations to them, which imagination has bestowed. We voluntarily exert imagination, when our intention is, merely to gather together such ideas as suit our present work; and in gathering them together, real connexions preserved by memory, are often of great service to us. Secondly, when we properly recollect ideas, they are no sooner brought into our view, than we have a conviction that either they themselves, or the objects from which they are derived, have been formerly perceived by us; and that conviction is attended to by the mind: when the ideas are brought into view by the imagination, either we have no such conviction, or we take no notice of it. These two, recollection and the exercise of imagination, are conjoined in producing every work of genius, but not equally in works of all kinds, nor in the genius of all persons.
(II.ix, pp. 265-6)