Transhistorical Intentions and the Persistence of Allegory

Author(s): E. D. Hirsch, Jr.

Source: New Literary History, Vol. 25, No. 3, 25th Anniversary Issue (Part 1) (Summer, 1994),
pp. 549-567
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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 Intentionsand the
Transhistorical
Persistenceof Allegory
E. D. Hirsch,Jr.

For mypart I declare resolutelyand withall my

heart thatif I were called upon to writea book
whichwas to be vestedwiththe highestauthor-
ity,I should preferto writeitin such a waythata
reader could find re-echoedin mywordswhat-
ever truthshe was able to apprehend. I would
ratherwritein thiswaythanimpose a singletrue
meaning so explicitlythat it would exclude all
others, even though they contained no false-
hood thatcould give me offense.And if thisis
whatI would choose formyself,I will not be so
rash myGod, as to suppose thatso great a man
as Moses deserveda lessergiftfromyou.
Bk. 12
St. Augustine,Confessions,

Go littlebook, go littletragedy...
And as thereis so greatdiversity
In Englishand in writingof our tongue,
So prayI God thatno one miswritethee,
Nor thee mismeterfordefaultof tongue;
And wheresoeverthou be read or sung
That thou be understood,dear God I pray.
Chaucer, Troilusand Criseida,5.1786-98

A constitutionto containan accuratedetailofall

the subdivisionsof which its great powers will
admit,and of all the means bywhich theymay
be carriedinto execution,would partakeof the
prolixityof a legal code, and could scarcelybe
embraced by the human mind. It would prob-
ably never be understood by the public. Its
nature, therefore,requires that only its great
outlinesshould be marked,itsimportantobjects
designated, and the minor ingredientswhich
compose those objects be deduced from the
natureof the objects themselves.
John Marshall,M'Cullochv. Maryland

New LiteraryHistory,1994, 25: 549-567

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550 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

N 1967, about twoyearsbeforethe firstissue of NewLiterary

History,
I publisheda book thatofferedthe following
argument:If the
shared goal of scholarlyinterpretationis empiricalvalidity,then
authorial intentionmust be its necessarynormativeprinciple.1Since
that time,distractedby other subjects,I have writtenrathersparingly
about interpretation, but have continuedto ponder the subjectin light
of recent intellectualmovements.The main argumentsI proposed in
the sixtiescontinue to seem valid, but I have qualified and, I hope,
deepened them, withoutchanging their fundamentalcharacter.But
how could mymeaningbecome changedand deepened, and yetremain
in some sense the same? That questionregardingchange and sameness
over time is the focus of thispaper. It is a question that is intimately
connected withthe interpretation of literatureand law. The topic is a
big one that deserves a book-lengthstudy.I hope thatthisbriefessay,
sketchy as it mustbe, willforwardthe discussion.

I. The Persistenceof Intention

Since 1990 therehave appeared at least threetheoreticalbooks on the

subject of authorialintentionin textualinterpretation, plus numerous
Intention
articles.2 is a subject that refuses to go away,despite having
been banished by W. K. Wimsatt,NorthropFrye,Paul Brest,Jacques
Derrida,and Michel Foucault,to lista fewof theimposingnames. It was
Foucault who supplied almostin passingthe reason forthe persistence
of intention.It was in an essay whose aim was to send the author
packing,called "Whatis an Author?"Foucaultcoined theelegantphrase
the authorfunction,which, he says,is the "principle of thriftin the
proliferationof meaning."' Hence Foucault acknowledges that the
author functionis indispensable to meaning, while insistingthat the
reader can and should fulfillthe authorfunction.
That you cannot have a meaning withouthaving an intentionis a
propositionthatcannot be deduced a priorion theoreticalgrounds.It
would be possible to devise an artificiallanguage in whichthe conven-
tions for decoding writingwould be fullyexplicitand unambiguous.
That naturallanguage has a different characteris a contingent,empiri-
cal fact that enables natural language to be multicoded, myriad
conventioned,ambiguous,polysemic,and flexibleenough to represent
a large number of differentmeanings throughthe same sequence of
words.
The easiest and most obvious example of the semanticunderdeter-
minationofnaturallanguage is irony,particularly the unmarkedkindof
ironythatintendsto deceive the uninitiated."He's a brightboy"could

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 551

be intendedto convey(and could succeed in conveying)thathe is a dull

boy.Or contrariwise, thewordscould conveythatthe boyis bright.This
potential polysemyof language is one source of the problematicsof
interpretation.It accounts for the persistenceof the author function,
which is to say the persistentneed to invoke the idea of intentionin
order to enable wordsto mean one thingratherthananotherplausible
thing,or,as maybe, threethingsratherthan one.
But thereis no empiricalrequirementthatthe providerof the author
function-the begetterof the meaning-determining intention-has to
be the originalauthor(s). The author functioncan be providedby an
interveningeditor-author(like P in the Old Testament), or by the
reader-author(s)as recommendedbyFoucault as well as legal pragma-
tistsand many postmodernliterarycritics.But whetherthe meaning-
intentionis supplied bythe authorthroughthe reader or bythe reader
unconcerned withauthorialintent,an author functionthere mustbe.
That is an indefeasibleempiricalfeatureof language whichinsuresthat
intentionwillnot go away.

II. The PresumedDecline of Allegory

Allegoryis a different matter;it has more or less gone away.'Allegory

sufferedan apparentlypermanentdecline ofprestigebythe timeof the
Enlightenment,when the medieval practice of findingdeep Christian
doctrinalmeanings in pre-Christianwriterslike Ovid began to seem
otiose ifnot outlandish.The low reputationofallegoryin theEnlighten-
ment was furtherreinforcedin the romanticperiod by an aesthetic
preferenceforthesymbolwhichhas continuedto our day.Paul de Man,
with his flair for paradox, asserted not long ago that allegory is
superiorto symbolism,
aesthetically but he did so as a reversalof received
views.5To a modern reader,explicitmedievalallegorieslike Chaucer's
"Tale ofMelibee,"withcharactersnamed "Prudence"and "Sophia,"and
withplots exhibitingone-to-onecorrespondenceswithmoral and theo-
logical doctrines,seem wooden and dated. Withthe possible exception
of Chaucer's treatiseon the astrolabe,"Melibee" now seems his least
appealing work.
Moreoverthe apparentextravaganceofmedievalallegoricalinterpre-
tation greatlyoffendednineteenth-century theoristsof hermeneutics
likeSchleiermacher and Boeckh, who were concerned to put interpreta-
tion on a scientific
footing.If Ovid could be given Christian meanings,
then any author could be allegorized to mean just about anythingan
interpreterwished. Boeckh thereforeruled thatallegoricalinterpreta-
tionswereillegitimate, unless theworkannounced itsexplicitlyallegori-

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552 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

cal character, as in the case of "Melibee" or the Fairie Queene.6

Schleiermacher, forhis part,simplystipulatedthatno interpretation was
legitimate that would not have been conceived to be the meaningbythe
writer'soriginalaudience.7
Schleiermacher'sprohibitionof anachronismtouches the heart of
what I take allegoryto be. Allegoryof the sortI wishto discussin this
paper is oftenstrikingly anachronisticin Schleiermacher'ssense,in that
it often contains meanings that neither the original author nor the
original audience would have directlyconstrued from the writing.
Virgil's audience, for instance, would not have construed Christian
doctrinefromthe "FourthEclogue." Yet writingthatis formedin one
time and place, but applied in another,could hardlyfail to break
Schleiermacher'srule.Hans Georg Gadamerdid wellto pointthisout in
his critiqueof the philologicaltradition.8 Despite mycriticisms of much
in Gadamer's account of hermeneutics,I have come to believe thathe
was deeplyrightto argue,againstBoeckh and Schleiermacher,thatthe
applicationof a textis a legitimatepart of its meaning. Indeed, in the
Renaissance,the termapplication was used as a synonymforallegory,as
we note fromSidney's "Apologyfor Poetry."'Application,and hence
anachronism, and hence, as I shall argue, allegory,form implicit
featuresin the interpretation of all writingsthatare intended to apply
across time-the kindsof writings, thatis, thatare found in literature,
law,and religion.
Such writingtypically intendsto conveymeaningbeyonditsimmedi-
ate occasion into a futurecontextwhichis verydifferent fromthatof its
As
production. Augustine and Marshall indicate in the epigraphsto this
paper, authors of such future-oriented writings intend to make them
applicable to (in other words, allegorizable to) unforeseen situations.
The basic structuresof those futuresituationsmay be preimagined,
making the structureof the allegoryanalogousto the structureof the
originalmeaning.But the specificcontentof a futureanalogy,asJustice
Marshallargued,cannotbe known.Hence in producingtransoccasional
writing,one almostalwaysintends"contents"thatgo beyondthe literal
contentsof one's mind.
Examples of Justice Marshall's principle can be found in recent
interpretations of the equal-protectionclause of theFourteenthAmend-
ment of the Constitution-nowheremore memorablythan in Brownv.
BoardofEducation(1954). Plessyv. Ferguson(1896) had ruled thatequal
but separate railwaycars forwhitesand blacksfulfilledthe principleof
equal protection. (Later, by analogy,Plessy'spublic railwaycars were
allegoricallyapplied to public schools.) Whatmakes the Brownreversal
of Plessyso interesting forhermeneuticaltheoryis itsbeing partlybased
on a recentlydeterminedrelevantfactabout the social worldunknown

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 553

or unaccepted by the interpretersin Plessy--namelythat in the

American contextthe psychologicaleffectsof separate facilitiesmake
them inherently unequal. Thus, on the basis of a "truer"understanding
of what Marshall called "the nature of the objects themselves,"the
justices ruled thatseparate facilitiesare inherentlyunequal. As I shall
argue later,thatwas a legitimateallegoricalinterpretationof the equal-
protectionclause, because it followsa general principlefordetermin-
ing allegorical legitimacy.
Literaryauthors have sometimesmade theirfuture-oriented inten-
tionsan explicitthemeof theirwriting, as in Horace's ode thatstarts"A
monumentI've raised more strongthan brass" (III, 30). His prediction
of his durabilityproved true,notjust byvirtueof the excellence of his
verse,but chieflybyvirtueof the broad strokeswithwhichhe describes
the human situation:"Don't worryabout how much timewe have leftto
live. Be contentwithwhatevertime the gods give you. Be wise, drink
wine, don't make long-rangeplans. Time flies,enjoy today,don't trust
the morrow" (I, 11). The themes resonate across time because the
reader easilyapplies them to his or her situationthrougha personal
analogy.Such analogical applicationto one's own lifeis an instanceof
allegorybecause the personalmeaninggoes beyondthe literalcontents
of Horace's mind, though it does not transgresshis transhistorical
intentions.
Similarly,allegoricalintentionsare alwaysimplicitin the most typical
formof literature,the story.Whyshould anyonebe interestedin a story
that lacks analogical applicationsto his or her own experience?What
small child, listeningto the storyof Cinderella,does not identifywith
her being condemned to an inferiorstatusin relationto adults?And
whatchild does not gloriouslyidentify withCinderella'stransformation
into a beautiful,adultlypowerfulprincess?It's a rare child who on
hearingthatstorydoes not make such implicitanalogieswithhis or her
life-a fact that accounts for the immortalityof the story.(Bruno
Bettelheim in the Uses of Enchantment has produced a full kit of
allegoricalmeanings for fairytales.) Children do not need to be taught
the allegoricalityof "The Three LittlePigs" or of Aesop's fables.They
don't have to be told thatthose literalpigs and foxesand tortoisesand
hares are allegoricallyhumanslike themselves.Analogizingto one's own
experienceis an implicit,pervasive,usuallyuntaughtresponseto stories.
It is not too much to saythatallegoryis the onlyappropriatefulfillment
of a transoccasionalliteraryintention.

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554 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

III. Allegoryand the Streaksof the Tulip

But the enemyof allegoryis specificity. If a legal statutespecifiesthe
precise domain and limitsof itsapplication,judges willrarelybe so bold
as to transgressthose explicitlimits.A law thatforbidsthe runningof a
red lightwillnot usuallybe interpretedas forbiddingthe runningof a
painted sign thatsays"STOP," whereas a less specificstatutewouldbe
judged to coverthe case of a painted stop sign.A romanaiclefthattakes
itschiefinterestfromitsreferencesto specificfiguresof thedaywilllose
itsinterestand applicability whenthosefiguresfadefromview.Chaucer's
"Tale of Melibee" has lost much of its presentallegoricalityprecisely
because itsmedievalallegoricality is so specificand so dated.
Dr. Johnson had such principlesin mind in a famous passage of
Rasselas: "The business of a poet, said Imlac, is to examine, not the
individual,but the species; to remarkgeneral propertiesand large
appearances: he does not number the streaksof the tulip,or describe
the different shades in the verdureof the forest.He is to exhibitin his
portraits of nature such prominentand strikingfeatures,as recall the
to
original every mind. .... He mustwriteas the interpreterof nature
and the legislatorof mankind,and consider himselfas presidingover
the thoughtsand mannersof futuregenerations."'0
This advice runsexactlycounterto the literarytenetsthathave come
to dominateliteraturesinceJohnson."To generalize,"said Blake, "is to
be an idiot. To particularizeis the alone distinctionof merit.""In that
debate,Blake has emergedvictorious,as anystudentin a creativewriting
programwillattest.The dominanttheoryof literary writinghas come to
be thatof realism,whichholds thatthe bestwayto conveyhuman truth
is to show human experience in its particularity--most reliablyfrom
one's own direct experience. The best way to transcendhistoryis to
immerseone's plot and charactersin the particularities of history.The
explanation of this paradox lies in the truth that all human experience
is colored by particularitiesof time and place. That is the theoryof
realismupon which,forexample, Warand Peacewaswritten, a workthat
has not become dated.
But the theoreticaldebate betweenJohnsonand Blake is less unyield-
ing thanitappears to be on thesurface.In practice,literary realismdoes
use theJohnsonianprincipleof vague generalityas its implicitmiddle
term.A realisticstorythatis fullofhistoricaland individualparticularity
is, afterall,just as subjectto a reader's personal analogizingas a Greek
tragedy.The broad interestand emotional force of realistliterature
would be lost unless it implicitlyencouraged readers to analogize to
their own experience. There are implicit mediations between the
particularities of the story'sworldand the particularities of the reader's

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 555

worldwhichcannot be otherthan those vague (unspoken) Johnsonian

generalitiesthat enable a personal applicationto be made. Hence the
theoretical disagreement about numbering or not numbering the
streaksof the tulip reallyamounts to a disagreementabout style,not
about ultimate principle. The transhistorical, Johnsonian principle
remainsvalid, even though realismhas proved to be a more effective
literarytechnique, and has carried the day. The danger thatJohnson
wished to avoid was datedness-a fate that awaitswritingwhich is so
explicitlytied down to specificpresent implicationsas to leave little
room forfutureapplications.

IV. DispensingwithAllegory
Boeckh prohibitedallegoricalinterpretation unless therewere clear
indicatorsof allegoricalintent,fearingthatinterpretation would other-
wise be unconstrained.Interpreterswould be free to constructany
meaningstheypleased, includingmeaningsthatdirectlycontraveneda
writer'soriginal intentions.Jefferson,in the same vein, expressed his
suspicion of unconstrainedinterpretationof the Constitution:"I had
ratherask an enlargementof powerfromthe nation,whereit is found
necessary,than to assume it by a constructionwhichwould make our
powersboundless. Our peculiarsecurityis in a writtenConstitution.Let
us not make it a blank paper by construction.""12 Today such fears
continue to animate constitutional"originalists."Boeckh was the fore-
runnerof Bork. Originalistswish to bind interpretation to the explicit
(and implicit)contentof the originalmeaning,thusapparentlydispens-
ing withthe need forallegory.
But an inherentdifficulty withBoeckhian or Borkian originalismis
thatoriginalintentionsare not,as a matterof empiricalfact,limitedto
original meanings, even when these are broadly conceived. As Dr.
Johnson,JusticeMarshall,Saint Augustine,and othershave observed,
writershave an eye to "thethoughtsand mannersoffuturegenerations"
and they thereforeintendtheir writingsto have meanings that go
unforeseeablybeyond theiroriginal,literalcontents.(I vividlyremem-
ber my distresswhile listeningto Judge Bork's literalistobservations
during his Supreme Court confirmationhearings, and thinkingto
myself that Bork's narrow literalism could only give intelligent
intentionalisma bad name.)
At the other extreme are rigorous anti-originalists who wish to
dispense with authorial intentaltogether.JusticeWilliam O. Douglas is
reputed to have said, "Withfivevotes,we can do anything."For this
school of thought,it is the reader or judge who supplies the author

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556 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

function.Althoughintentionstilldeterminesmeaning,as it must,it is
the reader'sintentionthat is dispositivefor these theorists.This anti-
originalistposition has no more need of allegorythan the originalist
one. A distinguishedanti-originalist, W. K. Wimsatt,once argued that
Blake's antimarriagepoem, "London," was, under his interpretation, a
poem that reallyfavoredmarriage.'3If anti-originalist
readingscan make
"no" mean "yes" without recourse to allegory,then allegoryis scarcely
wherevertheywantto go.
needed to take anti-intentionalists
Whereas originalismfears that allegorywill transgressmeaning in
favorof the reader's presentpoliticalor otherinterest,anti-originalism
thinksthat the reader's present interestis the criterionthat counts.
Where the originalistfearsthe lack of an empirical,cognitivenorm of
subordinatesthe elusive aim of cogni-
correctness,the anti-originalist
tivecorrectnessto more "vital"normsof political,ethical,or aesthetic
correctness.Both extremeviewsabout originalintent--theone submit-
ting to it, the other repudiating it-can confidentlydispense with
allegory.

V. Augustine'sThird Way

notablyin De
When Saint Augustinetheorizedabout interpretation,
Doctrina Christianaand Book XII of The Confessions,he was concerned
with writingsthat had been authored by God. His most detailed
hermeneuticalspeculationswereoccasioned byhis interpretation of the
opening words of TheBookof which
Genesis, bytraditionhad been written
under God's guidance by Moses. Augustineknew in advance that the
rightlyunderstoodmeaningof Scripturewould alwaysbe true.Thus his
hermeneuticalproblem seems at firstsightto be differentfromthat
involvingsecular writings.Human authorsmay intend truth,but they
can be wrong--a difficultywithwhichAugustinedid not have to cope.
"Let us honour Moses yourservant,who deliveredyourScripturesto us
and was filledwithyour Spirit,by believingthatwhen he wrotethose
words, by your inspiration,his thoughtswere directed to whichever
meaning sheds the fullestlightof truth."14
On the otherhand, Augustinedidhave to cope withthe factthatno
human could understandGod's truthin itsfullnessand depth.Accord-
ingly,he developed the interpretive principleof accommodation.God
accommodated truthto each person in a waythatwas suitableto that
person's educational, intellectual,or historicallimitations.Not even
Moses,forinstance,had been vouchsafedthehighertruththatwould be
broughtto humankindby Christ.This principleof divineaccommoda-
tion explains whythe Old Testamentmustbe interpretedallegorically.

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 557

We knowin advance thatthe truemeaningsof the older writingsmust

be consistentwiththose of the newer,and thatthe New Testamentis a
more adequate historicalmanifestationof the truththatGod eternally
intended. We know in advance that the Old Testament,having been
accommodated by God to the understandingsof an earliertime,must
be interpretedallegoricallyin the lightof a fullerrevelation.
It mightseem at firstglance that the infallibleAuthorwithwhom
Augustinehad to deal mightmake his theoriesconformonlyto a special
case. But Augustine'sabilityto assume the truthfulness of Scripture
actually liberated him to develop some important and profoundideas
about historicalaccommodation, about correctnessin allegory,and
about interpretationin general. The assumptions that Scripture is
ultimately trueand is knownin advance to promoteCaritasdid not solve
forAugustinethe practicalinterpretive problemsinvolvingthe human
coauthorsand readersof Scripture.For "Truth[is] neitherHebrew,nor
Greek,nor Latin, nor of any other language" (Bk. 11, ch. 3). We may
know in advance that the Constitutionpromotes Libertas,but that's
hardlya solutionto the problemsof constitutionalinterpretation.
It is telling that both Augustine and Justice Marshall stress the
importanceofauthorialintention.The historicalMoses intended readers
to apprehend relevanttruthsthathe, Moses, did not and could not be
directlyaware of. The framersintended laterinterpreters to develop the
Constitution'sstatedprinciplesin waysthatcan be "deduced fromthe
nature of the objects themselves."The framerscould not possibly
predictall thevalid applicationsof thoseprinciplesnor all the "objects"
thathistorywould bringinto being. Yet those historicalauthorsnone-
theless consciouslymeant unforeseeabletruths.In the next section I
shall discusswhatAugustinecalled "truth"and Marshall"the nature of
the objects themselves."Here I wantto develop the point thatboth of
these theoristsrightlyfelt the need to validate the interpretationof
unforeseen meanings throughthe controllingprinciple of authorial
intent.
Because theyinsistupon this historicalgrounding,Augustine and
Marshallare simultaneously whichis to
originalistsand anti-originalists,
say that they are allegorizers.Despite the apparent anachronism of
medievalpractices,medievalallegoryusuallyunderstooditselfas being
a historicallygrounded activity. ErnstRobertCurtiushas shown thatin
early medieval times, the writingsof certainclassicalauthorslike Virgil
were confidentlyallegorized to implyChristianmeanings,because the
chosen classicalwriterswere regarded as auctores-thatis, authorsand
authoritiesin whomGod had breathedthe spiritof truthjust as He had
in the case of Moses.'5
The problem that Augustineset himselfwas whetherthere was in

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558 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

principleany such thingas an incorrectallegory.His answerwas "yes."

An allegoryis wrongif it is untrue to the spiritof the originalintent.
Interpretationmust alwaysgo beyond the writer'sletter,but never
beyond the writer'sspirit.And the writer'sspiritis determinednot
simplyby abstracttheological speculation about the nature of God's
truth,but is rooted in what Moses historicallyintended. Even if that
originalintentionwished to accommodate itselfto all sortsand condi-
tions of futurereaders and periods of history,stillit is to the spiritof
Moses's intentionto whichwe mustturnforinterpretive sanction,even
as we transcendthe immediate contentsof that intention.For both
Augustineand JusticeMarshall,empiricalinformationabout authorial
intentis importantfordeterminingthe correctnessofallegory,since the
limitsof allegoryare determinedby the spiritif not the letterof the
original intention.Allegoristsin the Augustinianmold would never
like Wimsattare willingto do, thata piece of
claim, as anti-originalists
writingcould directlycontravenethe author'shistoricalintent.

VI. Allegoryand Reference

Earlier I stated that Brown'soverrulingof Plessywas an example of
legitimateallegory,because Brownwas based on a currentunderstand-
ing of the realityto whichthe law referred.Relevantrealityas currently
understoodis one of the two legitimatingprinciplesforallegory.The
other principle-that of constraintby original intention-will be ad-
dressedmore fullyin thenextsection.Mychieffocusherewillbe on the
concept of presentreference.An allegoricalinterpretation is legitimate
when there is an empiricallydetermined connection between the
original intentionto referand that intention'spresent reference.By
"reference" I mean what St. Augustine and John Marshall called
respectively "truth"or "the natureof the objects themselves."
Ever since Frege's essay"On Sense and Reference,"the interrelation
betweenmeaningand referencehas been a much-discussed philosophi-
cal topic.'6For hermeneutics,the most fruitful of the discussionshave
concerned tworivaltheoriesabout thewaynames referto thingsin the
world: (1) by describingthemor (2) bysimplynamingthem.J. S. Mill
held the view,laterseconded byKripkeand others,thatnames arejust
tags devoid of any necessarycontent. "George Washington"on that
theory,is just a label for a person who would have been George
Washingtonif he had never commanded the Americanarmyor been
President,or been the subject of any other description.A contrary
theory, associatedwithFrege and Russell,is thatthemeaningof "George
Washington"entails a descriptionor clusterof descriptionslike "the

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 559

person who commanded the American armyduring the Revolution."

On thattheory,it is a meaning-description thatenables a name to pick
out and referto a person or thing.
Here's anotherexample: On theblank-tagtheoryof names,"water"is
a wordthatmerelydenotes thestuffthatflowsin riversand comes out of
the faucet,no matterwhatits chemical nature actuallyhappens to be,
and no matterwhatthe speakerknowsor doesn't knowabout water.On
the description-theory, by contrast,wateris denoted by descriptorslike
"the stuffthat flowsin riversand comes out of the faucet,and whose
chemical formulais H20O."The debates oversuch issueswere generated
originallyby the attempt to overcome certain paradoxes of logical
analysis.By now,however,the fascinatingargumentsbetween the two
camps have receded, and the currently dominantviewis thatreference
must involvebothdescriptivecontentand nondescriptivetagging.The
details of this mixed conception must remain undiscussed; what is
importantformypresentpurpose is to bringinto reliefthe profound
insightintroducedby the blank-tagtheoryof names, even though that
theoryisn't the whole story.
The importanceoftheblank-tagtheoryforhermeneutics(and forthe
understandingof allegory)is a reminderthat wordscan and do refer to
evenwhenthespeaker's
realities actualmentalcontents
turnouttobeinadequate
or wrong.My intention to refer to George Washingtonis by itself
adequate to refer to him even if some of my ideas about him are
incorrect.Somebodymightsaythat"Hirschdidn'treallyreferto George
Washington,because Hirschwronglybelievedin the mythof the cherry
tree."But Kripkeand his allieswould answerthatHirschreallydid refer,
because a realityin the world is not picked out by descriptions,but
ratherby a name thathas a historicalcontinuityor causal chain. This
chain stretchesfrom George Washington'soriginal naming by his
parents,on throughtimein a historicallinkingof linguisticusage to my
currentuse of the name. The person who happened to be named
"GeorgeWashington"at birthwould remainthatpersonno matterwhat
subsequent,describableexperienceshe happened to undergo,and our
later use of his name will trulyreferto him, regardlessof our mental
notions,byvirtueof the continuityof linguisticusage.
That the blank-tag,causal-chain,social-linktheoryof names is not by
is clear fromthe factthatwordsare rarelyused as mere
itselfsufficient,
propernames whichpick out or referto unique realities.Normallyeven
a mere name can referto quite differentrealities,which is whythe
Romans distinguishedbetweenPlinythe Elder and Plinythe Younger.
Justto say "Pliny"wouldn'tpick out a unique referenceany more than
just to say"equality."In orderto determinewhatthe referentis, one has
to do more thanjust utterthe word. One has to add descriptionslike

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560 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

"Elder" or 'Younger,"and in the case of a word like "equality"or a

phrase like "equal protectionof thelaws,"one has to describeand imply
a greatdeal more.
But in thesame waythata naming-baptism is necessaryforstartingthe
causal chain thatenables our use of "GeorgeWashington"to refer,so a
meaning-baptism is necessaryto enable a phrase like "equal protection
of the laws" to refer.This meaning-baptism was the historicalmeaning-
intentof the originalmakersand ratifiersof the FourteenthAmend-
ment. In thispreliminary are on firmphilosophical
respect,originalists
ground,sincewithouttheoriginatingact ofmeaning,thereis no startof
the causal chain that determinesreference.The originatingact has
contentthathelps determinethe natureof the intentionto refer.
But that original historical content is scarcely the whole story.
Originalistsare trapped in the Frege-Russelldescription theory of
reference.That theoryneeds to be supplementedbythecausal theoryof
referencein order to explain how it happens thata writeror speakeris
able to referto a realityeven in the absence of accurate descriptive
knowledge about the reality.If inadequate knowledge were not a
pervasive characteristicof speaking and writing,we fallible humans
would rarelybe able to refer.The purelynamingaspect of the original
meaning-actenables the act to refereven when its mentalcontentsor
descriptionsare inadequate or wrong.Normally,thedescriptionswillbe
partlywrong,not because of our intentionto lie, but because of our
limited knowledge.17 It is this purely naming aspect of writingand
speaking (which,as I have argued elsewhere,is pervasivein language)
thatenables us to refernotjust to presentrealitiesbut also to realities
thathave not yetcome into being.
The principleof transhistoricalreferenceis easyto observein certain
literaryexamples.Take Shakespeare'sadaptationof Horace's aforemen-
tioned ode in Sonnet 55:

Notmarblenortheguildedmonuments
Of princesshalloutlivethispowerfulrhyme,
Butyoushallshinemorebright in thesecontents
Than unswept stonebesmeared withsluttish
time.
When wastefulwarshall statuesoverturn
And broilsroot out the workof masonry,
Nor Mars his swordnor war's quick fireshall burn
The livingrecordof yourmemory.
'Gainstdeath and all obliviousenmity
Shall you pace forth;yourpraise shall stillfindroom
Even in the eyesof all posterity
That wear thisworldout to the ending doom.

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 561

So, tillthejudgmentthatyourself arise,

You livein this,and dwellin lovers'eyes.'18

Our theoreticalinteresthere is summed up in the last line. The

sonnettakesforgrantedthe permanentapplicabilityof itsreferencesto
human self-glorification and the devastationsof timeand war.But,as in
Horace, the poet's confidence thathis poem will continue to referfar
into the futurelies notjust in itsmasterfulcraftsmanship, but also in its
confidencethatthe "eyesof all posterity" willcontinueto be kindledby
love. Those who willrevive"you"in the futurewillbe people who have
experienced the intense feelings of a love like ours. That is the
transhistorical realityto which the poem refers,and on which it relies
foritsimmortality. In the technicaljargon of philosophers,Shakespeare
is relyingon the "transworldidentity"of lovers' feelingsin all present
and futuretimes.Because theliteralcontentofthepoem is so explicitin
its instructionsfor futurity, it might seem odd to call the poem
allegorical. But consider how vague and uncertainboth the "you"and
the "lovers"are untilthe reader refersthem-which is to say,allegorizes
them-to the realitiesof his or her experience.
In Plessyv.Ferguson (1896) the SupremeCourtupheld a Louisiana law
that required railroadsto segregatepassengersby race. Homer Plessy
was a black man who argued thatLouisiana was not offeringhim equal
protectionof the laws,since enforcedsegregationcertifiedthe inferior
status of blacks and gave that inferiority officialstanding.Instead of
he
offeringequal protection, argued, the law actuallyreinforcedin-
equality. In its ruling the Court rejected this argument,writing:"We
consider the underlyingfallacyof [Plessy's]argumentto consistin the
assumptionthat the enforcedseparation of the two races stamps the
colored race witha badge of inferiority. If thisbe so it is not because of
anything found in the act,but solelybecause the colored race chooses to
put that construction upon it."19
Thus the Court decided that a black sense of inferiority was self-
interpreted rather than objectivelyreinforced bylegal segregation.But
even in 1896 JusticeHarlan, in dissent,agreed with Homer Plessy-
showingmovementeven then towardthe later understandingof state
stigmatization. By 1954, Thurgood Marshall,arguingforBrown,could
offer supporting evidence from social science, especially from the
studiesof KennethClark,whichdemonstratedthatyoungchildrenwere
psychologicallystigmatizedby state-imposedsegregation.Quite apart
fromthe changed climateof ethicalopinion in 1954 (whichplayed the
decisiverole, no doubt) thisfindingof factwould have sufficedto show
thatBrownwas a legitimateallegory-that it reflectedour latestunder-

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562 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

standingof the relevantreality.In the finalsectionof thissketch,I shall

tryto show that both poles of referenceare required for legitimate
allegory:a past intentionto referto a realityand a presentunderstand-
ing of thatreality.Althoughboth poles are problemanticalin practice,
the messinessof practicecan be guided by clarityof principle.

VII. The Limitsof Allegory

I shall close thisbriefsketchwithan attemptto reassureoriginalist
followersofJefferson, Boeckh,and Borkwho fearthatit is impossibleto
constraininterpretation once you startdown the allegoricalpath. I shall
also tryto reassurethose who fear the irrelevanceof pure originalism.
Originalistsneed to realize thatallegoryis a necessary tool forinterpret-
ing all transoccasionalwritings, and thatpure originalismrisksturning
our writteninheritanceinto a dead letter.But the risksgo in both
directions.While rejectionof allegoryleads to pure backward-pointing
anachronismthat deprivesinterpretationof present applicability,un-
constrainedallegory,or its fraternaltwinanti-intentionalism, leads to
pure forward-pointing anachronismthatrisksturninga literary workor
the Constitutioninto a "blank of
piece paper."
A perennialand validjustificationof allegoryhas alwaysbeen the idea
ofprogressin knowledge.Advancesin our understandingof"theobjects
themselves"was the Supreme Court'sjustificationforoverturning Plessy,
as it was Augustine'sjustificationforChristianizing the Old Testament.
In both cases, a deeper truthhad been revealed thatdeterminedthe
true referenceof the old writing.Under thisprincipleof progressive
knowledge,even medieval allegorizersof Homer were sound in prin-
ciple. Their faultlayin theirempiricalinaccuracyregardingthe spiritof
Homer's originalmeaning-intentions, not in theirfindinganachronistic
is
allegorical meanings.Allegory inherentlyanachronistic.Macrobius
and otherswere rightto hold thatthe presentmeaningof the ancients
is the transhistoricalreality to which they meant to refer in the
incompletenessof theirknowledge.
That progress in knowledge is indeed a legitimatinginterpretive
principle may be illustratedby the followinghighly anachronistic
allegoryfromthe historyof science.JosephPriestleyhas been credited
with having isolated oxygen,because he observed that combustion
required a certain kind of gas, which he successfullyisolated. But
because he mistakenlyadhered to the phlogisthontheory,Priestley
called his combustion-inducinggas dephlogisticated air. Despite that
peculiar and, in the event,wrong description, historians of science
rightlyallegorize dephlogisticated air as Why
oxygen.20 is the allegory

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 563

airPriestleyreferredto and
legitimate?Because in sayingdephlogisticated
intendedto referto a gas thatwe currently
understandto be oxygen.His
Russellian"meaning"waswrong,but his Kripkeanreference
descriptive,
was right.
Here's a similarexample frompoetry:Coleridgefamouslywrote:

everywhere,
Water,water,
Andall theboardsdid shrink;
Water,water,everywhere,
Noranydropto drink.2

Does Coleridge referto He neverheard of H20O,so he could not

H2O0?
have entertainedsuch a mental content.But he did have intentionsto
referto a realitywhose chemicalformulawe currently understandto be
HO20.Applying the two criteriafor achievingallegoricallegitimacy,(1)
to
conformity original referential
intent and (2) conformity to currently
accepted truth,Coleridge did refer to H20O.The allegoricalinterpreta-
tion is legitimate.
But here's another example in the same scientific-poetic vein,which
has a different outcome. Blake wrote:

The AtomsofDemocritus
AndNewtons oflight
Particles
Aresandsupon theRed sea shore
WhereIsraelstentsdo shineso bright.22

Here Blake is nottakingthe atomictheoryand the particlecharacterof

lightas referring realities.He does not conceivethemto
to well-attested
be reliable truthseven in theirown narrow,positivistic domains. And,
indeed, in Blake's day,neitherthe atomictheorynor the particletheory
of lightwas widelyaccepted. Under our two-part criterionof legitimacy,
any valid interpretationof Blake's verses would be governed by his
original intention not to refer,and by his skepticism about the
referentialityof the theoriesofNewtonand Democritus.Hence itwould
be illegitimateto allegorize Blake's lines to referto present-dayatomic
theoryor to the photon theoryof light. Needless to say,if we were
interpreting Democritusand NewtoninsteadofBlake,theallegorization
to currently accepted belief wouldbe legitimate.
These examples fromPriestley,Coleridge, and Blake illustratethat
originalintentiondoes have the powerto grantor to denylegitimacyto
allegoricalinterpretations. The examples also show thatoriginaltruth-
intentionsare not thesame as originalmentalcontents.Indeed, the case
of dephlogisticatedair illustratesthe fact that sometimesin order to

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564 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

remain true to originalintentyou mustrejectoriginalmental content.

This paradox also holds outside the sphere of science. For instance,
cruel and unusual punishmentis prohibitedbythe EighthAmendment.
Most people agree that the death penalty,which is permittedby the
Eighth Amendmenttoday,is more cruel than floggingor the pillory,
whichare now forbiddenunder our currentapplicationof theAmend-
ment. Legitimate interpretationof the Eighth Amendment quite
anachronistically excludes floggingbyvirtueof the factthatthe punish-
ment goes against today's ethical consensus, not just on the narrow
ground that it is currentlyunusual. In the law, the currentethical
consensusisjust as determinative of presentinterpretive truthas is the
currentscientificconsensusregardingoxygenand phlogisthon.
Whyis the idea of presentconsensuscriticalin definingthe limitsof
legitimateallegory?To us falliblehumans, what Augustinemeant by
"truth"and Marshall by the "nature of the objects themselves"is, in
actual practice,identicalwithour currentconsensus-understanding of
reality.Having no access to divine certitude,we must be contentwith
human truth,whichmeans,in operationalterms,thatwhichwe happen
to believe now.
But suppose thatthe originalintentionreferredto somethingwhose
characteris now subject to widespreaddisagreement?Such a circum-
stance introducesa constraintupon the legitimacyof allegory.When
currenttheoriesabout naturalor social realityare highlyconflicted,we
cannotdeterminepresentreferentiality. Allegorycan be legitimateonly
withinthe contextof a communitythatagrees upon the nature of the
referent.If we did not in general agree that dephlogisticatedair is
oxygen, or that floggingis cruel and unusual, we could not make
legitimateallegoricalinterpretations concerningthose issues.Intersub-
jective human truths,beingfallibleand provisional,are timebound.The
legitimately allegoricalPlessyof 1896 became the illegitimately allegori-
cal Plessyof 1954.
But it mustbe rememberedthateven when presentconsensusexists,
consensus alone is not sufficient for legitimacy.Consensus is only the
second part of the two-partlegitimatingprinciple. Present-oriented
optimalists like Wimsatt neglectone of the parts.I call themoptimalists
because they hold that the "best" interpretationis the "right"one,
regardlessof originalintent.Wimsattargued thatin literarycriticism we
should choose the interpretation thatmakes the poem aestheticallythe
"best"poem it can be. Similarly, Ronald Dworkinwantsto privilegethe
legal interpretation which conforms to whatwe currently hold to be the
best ethical or politicalbeliefabout the relevantreality.2Verymuch in
the spiritof Wimsatt,Dworkinneglectsspecificintentas a regulative

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 565

principle in favorof interpretinga Constitutionthat is conceived to

yield onlyhighlyabstractinjunctionslike "act fairly."
Besides neglectingthe legitimating principleof accuratelyconstruing
the past,thiskindof allegorizationalso neglectshistoricalaccuracywith
regard to the present.Wimsatt'sand Dworkin'soptimalismwould be a
correctprincipleifit comprisedbothoriginalreferentiality and current
consensus. But in factoptimalismneglectsboth. Aestheticor political
"bestness"can deriveits normativeauthorityonlyfrompresentconsen-
sus. Withoutpresent consensus (which does not mean unanimity,of
course), thereis no presentreferentiality, hence no "true"bestness.In
interpreting the law, it is onlyafter consensushas been
ethical-political
reached (as in the case of flogging)that"the best"becomes a realityto
which the originalintentof the writingcould be said to refer.Without
strongagreement-almost as compellingas the agreementabout oxy-
gen-optimalism belongsin thesphere of exhortationor politicsrather
than legitimateallegorical interpretation.To be fair,that is where
optimalismactuallyresidesin Dworkin'swork,since he is not a practic-
ingjudge.
But suppose the Eighth Amendmentexplicitlypermittedflogging.
Then the limitsof allegorywould be quicklyreached, forspecificity in
writing creates an inescapable dissonance between past intentionsand
present consensus. We are able to allegorize the specific term
dephlogisticatedair to oxygen onlybecause the substancePriestleyisolated
has a transhistoricalrealitythat persistsinto the present. We also
recognize thatPriestleywas wrong.Flogginghas a transhistorical reality
too, but is no longer admissibleas ethical"truth."If our currentmoral
sense disagreeswiththe explicitlaw or the canonical literarytext,then
we ought to abandon the canonical textor repeal the law.The absolute
cry,"Save the text!" (to be accomplished presumablythroughillegiti-
mate allegory) is a slogan to be resisted.Betterto change the literary
canon or repeal the law than bring interpretationand the law into
disrepute.

In attemptingto resolvecertainlongstandingtechnicalproblemsin
hermeneutics,this essay has once again confirmedthe principle that
valid interpretationcannot be insulatedfromthe empirical.It cannot
dispense withthe posing of questionswhose answersare notknownin
advance. The empirical spiritin interpretationis the hopeful confi-
dence that fullerknowledgeof relevanthistoricalevidence will yield
greater interpretivetruth.Empirical work,as distinctfrom armchair
speculation,is self-correcting.
It can discoverthat it was wrong. Gov-
erned bythe empiricalspirit,even allegoricalinterpretationcan be seen

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566 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

to have gone wrongbecause offaultyinferencesabout eitherthe past or

the present.
On the otherhand, some allegoricalinterpreters, who followthe star
or constructivism,
of radical historicism believethatitis naive even to try
to understandthe past accurately.The interpretations of such histori-
cists can never go wrong. That may seem advantageous initially,but
intellectualwork that knows in advance that it cannot go wrong is
inherentlyuninteresting. The pretentioustriviality
of too muchworkin
the humanities comes from its "sophisticated"predictability. If "re-
search" alwaysleads to a predestinedideological correctness,littledust
need be raised in the archives. Originalismat least helps provide
archaeologicalfoundationsupon whichotherscan build.
Augustine'sthirdwayrequiresinterpreters to be learned both in the
originatingcircumstancesof writingas well as in theirown time.That
sternbut cognitively progressivedemand promisesinsightsthatcan be
both sound and unexpected. Compared to an easy constructivism,
Augustine'sthirdwayyieldsresultsmore durable and interesting.

UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

NOTES

1 E. D. Hirsch,Jr.,Validity in Interpretation
(New Haven, 1967).
2 Dieter Munch, Intention und Zeichen:Untersuchungenzu FranzBrantanound zu Edmund
HusserlsFriihwerk (Frankfurta/M, 1933); Gary Iseminger,Intentionand Interpretation
(Philadelphia, 1992); Philip R. Cohen, JerryL. Morgan,MarthaE. Pollack, Intentions in
Communication (Cambridge,Mass., 1990).
3 Michel Foucault, "WhatIs an Author?"in TextualStrategies, ed. Josue Harari (Ithaca,
1979), p. 159.
4 A stimulatingexception to thistheoreticalindifferenceis Gerald Bruns,Hermeneutics
Ancientand Modern(New Haven, 1992); also his reviewarticle "The Hermeneuticsof
Allegoryand the Historyof Interpretation,"Comparative 40 (1988), 384-95.
Literature,
Brunsmakesuse oftheworkofDonald Davidsonand his notionof"radicalinterpretation"
in his philosophical defense of allegory.I am less persuaded than Bruns by Davidson's
account, which replaces the concepts of "meaning"and "reference"witha consensus-
based linguisticdefinitionof "truth."As will be seen in the penultimatesection below,
while I agree up to a pointwithDavidson's idea of truthas consensus,I findhis razor too
sharp when he cuts offreferenceand meaning-for reasons thatwillappear.
5 Paul de Man, Allegories ofReading:FiguralLanguagein Rousseau,Nietzsche, Rilke,and
Proust(New Haven, 1979).
6 August Boeckh, Encyclopaedie un Methodologiederphilologischen ed. F.
Wissenschaften,
Bratuscheck,2nd ed. (Leipzig, 1886), p. 40.
7 Fr. D. E. Schleiermacher,Hermeneutik, ed. Heinz Kimmerle(Heidelberg, 1959), p. 90:
"Everythingin a given text which requires fullerexplanation must be explained and
determinedexclusivelyfromthelinguisticdomain common to theauthorand his original
public" (mytranslation).
8 Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truthand Method,tr. rev.Joel Weinsheimerand Donald G.

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TRANSHISTORICAL INTENTIONS 567

Marshall, 2nd. rev. ed. (New York, 1989). I sketch in detail points of agreement and
disagreementin my"Meaningand SignificanceRe-Interpreted," Critical 11 (1984/
Inquiry,
85), 201-25.
9 Sir Philip Sidney,An Apology in SirPhilipSidney,
forPoetry, ed. KatherineDuncan-Jones
(Oxford, 1989), p. 228: "The application most divinelytrue, but the discourse itself
feigned."
10 Samuel Johnson,TheHistory ofRasselas,PrinceofAbissinia, ed. Geoffrey Tillotsonand
BrianJenkins(London, 1971), ch. 10.
11 William Blake, "Annotationsto the Worksof SirJoshua Reynolds,"in The Complete
Poetry and ProseofWilliamBlake,ed. David V. Erdman (Garden City,N.Y., 1982), p. 641.
12 ThomasJefferson, LettertoWilsonC. Nicholas,7 September1803,in Thomas Jefferson:
Lettersand Addresses, ed. WilliamB. Parkerand JonasViles (New York,1908), p. 154.
13 W. K. Wimsatt,"Genesis,An ArgumentResumed,"in his Day oftheLeopards:Essaysin
DefenseofPoems(New Haven, 1976), pp. 30-35.
14 Augustine,Confessions, tr.WilliamWatts(New York, 1914), Bk. 13, ch. 30; hereafter
cited in text.
15 ErnstRobertCurtius,EuropeanLiterature and theLatinMiddleAges,tr.WillardR. Trask
(New York,1953), pp. 52-58.
16 See Saul A. Kripke, Naming and Necessity (Cambridge, Mass., 1980); also Keith
Donnellan, "Proper Names and IdentifyingDescriptions,"Synthese, 21 (1970), 335-58.
HilaryPutnam,"The Meaning of Meaning,"in Language,Mind and Knowledge, ed. Keith
Gunderson (Minneapolis,1975), rpt.in his Philosophical Papers,vol. 2 (Cambridge,1975),
pp. 215-71; Leonard Linsky,Namesand Descriptions (Chicago, 1977). A usefulcollectionis
Naming Necesssity, and NaturalKinds,ed. Stephen Schwartz(Ithaca, 1977).
17 Sir PhilipSidney,An Apologyfor Poetry,p. 235, "Thattheyshould be the principalliars,
I answerparadoxically,but truly,I thinktruly,thatof all writersunder the sun the poet is
the least liar. ... The astronomer,withhis cousin the geometrician,can hardlyescape,
when theytake upon them to measure the heightof the stars."
18 Shakespeare,Sonnet 55, in Shakespeare's Sonnetsand A Lover'sComplainted. Stanley
Wells (Oxford, 1985), p. 69.
19 Plessyv. Ferguson, 163 U.S. at 551. I take thispassage fromLawrence Lessig's highly
informative discussionof legal hermeneutics,"Fidelityin Translation,"TexasLaw Review,
71 (1993), 1165-1267.
20 An excellent account of the significanceof the Priestley-Lavoisier controversy over
phlogisthonis to be found in chapter4 of PhilipKitcher,TheAdvancement ofScience(New
York,1993), pp. 90-126.
21 "The Rime oftheAncientMariner,"in TheComplete Works ofSamuelTaylorColeridge, ed.
E. H. Coleridge, 2 vols. (Oxford,1957), I, 191, 11.119-22. Coleridge could have possibly
known thatwateris composed of "inflammableair" and "dephlogisticatedair," had he
read HenryCavendish,TheComposition ofWater(1783). Currentlyour allegoricalinterpre-
tation of the twokinds of "air" thatCavendishrefersto are respectively "hydrogen"and
"oxygen."
22 Blake, "Mock on Mock on VoltaireRousseau,"in Complete Poetry and Prose,p. 478, 11.9-
13.
23 Ronald Dworkin,Law's Empire(Cambridge,Mass., 1986), pp. 397-99.

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