The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia · Chapter
XLIV: The Dangerous Prevalence of Imagination explained
Imlac warns that unchecked imagination can lead to a form of madness, as fictions begin to operate as realities.
What happens
Imlac warns that unchecked imagination can lead to a form of madness, as fictions begin to operate as realities. The favorite, the Princess, and the Prince each confess their own indulgent fantasies, from imagining royalty to pastoral idylls to schemes of perfect government, illustrating the danger of allowing fancy to dominate reason.
Themes in this chapter
The Limits of Reason and Imagination
Imlac's discourse highlights how imagination can overpower reason, leading to a degree of insanity when it becomes ungovernable.
The Vanity of Human Wishes
The characters' fantasies—royal power, pastoral innocence, perfect government—are shown as vain and ultimately unsatisfying.
Characters to notice
- Imlac
Delivers a discourse on the dangerous prevalence of imagination and its potential to become ungovernable.
- Rasselas
Confesses his indulgence in imagining a perfect government, even to the point of contemplating the death of his father and brothers.
- Nekayah
Admits to playing the shepherdess in her waking dreams, complete with a costume and pipe.
- Pekuah
The favorite confesses to imagining herself as the Queen of Abyssinia, regulating the court and building palaces.
Key passages
“All power of fancy over reason is a degree of insanity, but while this power is such as we can control and repress it is not visible to others, nor considered as any deprivation of the mental faculties; it is not pronounced madness but when it becomes ungovernable, and apparently influences speech or action.”
Any dominance of imagination over reason is a form of insanity, but as long as we can control it, it goes unnoticed and is not considered a mental defect; it is only called madness when it becomes uncontrollable and visibly affects what we say or do.
Imlac defines the threshold between normal fancy and true madness.
“I have frequently endeavoured to imagine the possibility of a perfect government, by which all wrong should be restrained, all vice reformed, and all the subjects preserved in tranquillity and innocence.”
I have often tried to picture a flawless government that would prevent all injustice, correct every vice, and keep all citizens peaceful and innocent.
Rasselas confesses his dangerous fantasy of a perfect political system.