"Were it necessary to produce instances of a fruitful imagination unproductive of true genius, we might find enough among those pretenders to poetry, who can, through many lines, run from one shining image to another, and finish many harmonious periods, without any sentiment or design; or among those pretenders to science, who can devise a hundred experiments, coinciding in all their material circumstances, without a view to any conclusion, and without advancing useful knowledge a single step. Such imagination is like a tree so overcharged with fruit, that no part of it can come to full maturity."
An Essay on Genius
Only 1 entry in ESTC (1774).<br>
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<u>An Essay on Genius. By Alexander Gerard, D.D. Professor of Divinity in King's College, Aberdeen.</u> (London: Printed for W. Strahan; T. Cadell, and W. Creech at Edinburgh 1774). &lt;<a href="http://find.galegroup.com/ecco/infomark.do?&source=gale&prodId=ECCO&userGroupName=viva_uva&tabID=T001&docId=CW3315407235&type=multipage&contentSet=ECCOArticles&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE">Link to ECCO</a>&gt;