The Fourth Book (“The Winter Evening”) is entirely free from instances of the mechanical abstraction, but the vision of Oriental Empire, and the fascination of the East, is effectively evoked in the personification of the land of the Moguls:
Is India free? and does she wear her plumed
And jewelled turban with a smile of peace.
(ll. 28-9)
“The Task,” however, has two examples of the detailed personification. The first is an attempt, in the manner of Spenser, to give a full length portrait of “a sage called Discipline”:
His eye was meek and gentle and a smile
Played on his lips, and in his speech was heard
Paternal sweetness
(Bk. II, l. 702 foll.)
where there is a depth of feeling, as well as a gentle satiric touch in the delineation, that animate it into something more than a mere stock image; it embodies perhaps a reminiscence of one who at some time or other had guided the destinies of the youthful Cowper.