On its formal side, and reduced to its simplest expression, we may narrow down for our present purpose the whole system to the further distinction drawn by Blake between Allegory and Vision. Allegory is “formed by the daughters of Memory” or the deliberate reason; Vision “is surrounded by the daughters of Inspiration.” Here we have a key to the classification of personified abstractions in the eighteenth century, and, for that matter, at any and every period. Abstractions formed by the deliberate reason are usually more or less rhetorical embellishments of poetry, and to this category belong the great majority of the personifications of eighteenth century verse. They are “things that relate to moral virtues” or vices, but they cannot truly be called allegorical, for allegory is a living thing only so long as the ideas it embodies are real forces that control our conduct. The inspired personification, which embodies or brings with it a real vision, is the truly poetical figure.
In Blake’s own practice we find only a few instances of the typical eighteenth century abstraction. In the early “Imitation of Spenser” there are one or two examples:
Such is sweet Eloquence that does dispel
Envy and Hate that thirst for human gore,
whilst others are clearly Elizabethan reminiscences, like
Mournful lean Despair
Brings me yew to deck my grave,
or
Memory, hither come