Date: 1767

"These topics will, for the most part, be very extraordinary, and altogether unexpected; but they will constantly produce the intended effect. They will operate upon the mind by surprise; they will strike like lightening, and penetrate the heart at once."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"Thus the Poet, having by the force of Imagination formed lively images of the objects he proposes to describe, thinks only of expressing his ideas in smooth and harmonious numbers; the Painter, having the same vivid conception of every object, is wholly intent on exhibiting a representation of t...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"This fervor and enthusiasm of passion, may be termed the inspiration of Music; and is the principal quality which gives it such an irresistible empire over the human heart."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"A Genius for Architecture truly ORIGINAL, will, by the native force and plastic power of Imagination, strike out for itself new and surprising Models in this Art; and, by its combining faculty, will select out of the infinite variety of ideal forms that float in the mind, those of the Grand and ...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"He is perhaps the first Poet who hath arisen in this infant state of society; by which means he enjoys the undivided empire of Imagination without a rival."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"The mines of Fancy not having been opened before his time, are left to be digged by him; and the treasures they contain become his own, by a right derived from the first discovery. The whole system of nature, and the whole region of fiction, yet unexplored by others, is subjected to his survey, ...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"That some of her stores are more readily found than others, being less hid from the eye of Fancy, and some of her features more easily hit, because more strongly marked."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"It will be very difficult therefore for their successors to select objects which the eye of Fancy hath never explored, and none but a Genius uncommonly original can hope to accomplish it."

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"But however properly arranged those materials may be, and however thoroughly digested this intellectual food, an original Genius will sometimes find an inconveniency resulting from it; for as no man can attend to and comprehend many different things at once, his mental faculties will in some cas...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)

Date: 1767

"Nature supplies the materials of his compositions; his senses are the under-workmen, while Imagination, like a masterly Architect, superintends and directs the whole. Or, to speak more properly, Imagination both supplies the materials, and executes the work, since it calls into being 'things tha...

— Duff, William (1732-1815)