The Complete Prose of T. S. Eliot: The Critical EditionVol. 4: English Lion, 1930-1933

The Conceit in Donne and Crashaw

I want now to show, if I can, that the acceptance of an orderly system of thought results, with Dante and his friends, in a simple, direct and even austere manner of speech, while the maintenance in suspension of a number of philosophies, attitudes and partial theories which are enjoyed rather than believed, results, in Donne and some of his contemporaries, in an affected, tortuous and often over elaborate diction.

If you examine the figure of speech used by Dante, or by Cavalcanti, you will find that the difference between their images and those of Donne lies in the focus of interest. The interest of Dante lies in the idea or the feeling to be conveyed; the image is there to make the idea more intelligible, the feeling more apprehensible, the vision more visible. In Donne, the interest is dispersed, it may be, in the ingenuity of conveying the idea by that image; or the image may be more difficult than the idea; or the interest may lie in the compulsion, rather than in the discovery of resemblances. Part of the pleasure may derive from the incongruity which is overcome; part of the feeling is the feel of an idea, rather than the feeling of a person who accepts that idea. Let us look first at one image of Dante’s which I have quoted elsewhere. ² He is attempting to express the feeling of entering the first heaven, at the beginning of the Paradiso.

Pareva a me che nube ne coprisse          lucida, spessa, solida e polita,          quasi adamante che lo sol ferisse. Per entro sè l’eterna margarita          ne recepette, com’ acqua recepe          raggio di luce, permanendo unita.

It seemed to me that a cloud enveloped us, shining, dense, firm and polished, like a diamond struck by the sun. Within itself the eternal pearl received us, as water doth receive a ray of light, though still itself uncleft. ³

This imagery is by no means simple: we have the rapid transition from cloud to diamond, from pearl to water; and the aim is to convey one kind of image, a supra-sensible imagery, by another kind familiar to us. It is directed by a purpose of strict utility. The imagery is not meant to be interesting in itself; like all of Dante’s similes and metaphors, it has a rational necessity.

I do not want to draw my distinctions too sharply. I am aware that between the image of necessity and the extreme conceit there are infinite degrees; we could find many images from various sources of which it would be difficult to say whether they were serviceable or ornamental. One can, however, hardly define the “conceit,” a kind of figure of speech characteristic of the English, Italian and some Spanish poetry of the age of Donne, better than by saying that it is the antithesis of the kind of imagery in the passage just quoted from Dante. Not all of Donne’s imagery is “conceited.” Let us take two poems which are variations on the same theme: “The Funerall” and “The Relique.” The first begins:

Who ever comes to shroud me, do not harme         Nor question much That subtile wreath of haire, which crowns my arme; The mystery, the signe you must not touch,         For ’tis my outward Soule, Viceroy to that, which then to heaven being gone,         Will leave this to controule; And keepe these limbs, her Provinces, from dissolution. ⁴

This is typical of Donne’s procedure. The first three lines are peculiarly simple. The adjective “subtile” is exact; the simple statement is perfect; the only possible blemish is the slightly distracting metaphor hidden in the verb “crown.” But with line 5 Donne becomes wholly and characteristically conceited; you find yourself in a tangle of souls and deputy-souls, kings, viceroys and territories, and almost forget that this is all about a strand of a lady’s hair around his arm. And yet, though it is distracting, though...