Abstract: Valéry’s essay is said to be conceptual but might better be described as poetic. It is based on an “imaginative logic” which works with metaphors used to reflect the mind of the “universal man”, who distinguishes himself through his “mental reach” and “continuity”. By rendering an abstract vision concrete, Valéry creates a portrait of the “pure” intellectual’s intellect – inevitably incomplete – and shows it be a myth of modernity.
