Edgar Allen Poe created an interesting paradigm around his theory of the cosmic principle. He sees the universe as an artistic creation of God scattered among humanity. Artists, especially poets, bring the universe together by freeing themselves from their physical world and the corruption and materialism that correlates with it. To do this, poets must use their imagination and delve deep into their minds to find the original harmony of the universe. Poe's theory goes on to describe the dualistic nature of humanity, where man is both spiritual and rational. The spiritual side calls on imagination, emotion and creativity while the rational side remains earthly and far from cosmic unity. Ultimately, poets can only regain their unity with the universe through death. In Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death," Prince Prospero attempts to rid himself of the Red Death by retreating into his mind. Prospero represents the spiritualist side of the poet, and Red Death represents the earthly rationality of life. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Prospero represents the spiritual spirit of his character. Poe describes the spiritual poet as someone who seeks to shed his materialistic reality by "looking within the depths of his mind" (Poe's Cosmology). Furthermore, Prospero attempts to “free himself from time, reason and the physical world” (Poe’s Cosmology). The dualist poet creates his own reality – free from unpredictability, danger or death – and uses his imagination, creativity and emotions to approximate “the harmony of the universe” (Poe's Cosmology). In “The Masque of the Red Death,” the Red Death represents the experiences of life, creating a “voluptuous scene” (Poe 62). To escape the Red Death, Prospero retreats “into the deep solitude of one of his crenellated abbeys” and locks himself in with “iron gates” (Poe 62). Prospero's retreat is "bold and spirited" and filled with "much of the beautiful, much of the injustice, [and] much of the bizarre" (Poe 64). Prospero reconstructs a world within the abbey, where a “multitude of dreams… twisted in and around,” floating like the “wild music of the orchestra” (Poe 64). Prospero isolates himself in a world of emotions and images to escape his own profane physical environment, and Prospero thus creates an imaginary world of phantasmagorical environments within the walls of the abbey. According to the concept of dualism, a poet surrounds himself with his own creativity and beauty to escape a harsher reality. Likewise, Prospero surrounds himself with beautiful scenes and bizarre dreams in order to both escape the ugly reality of life and exclude his physicality – represented by the Red Death – from his mind. Just as Prospero represents the spiritual side of the dualist poet, Red Death represents the earthly rationality of life. Poe describes this side of the dualistic poet as possessing "rational knowledge" and characterizes it as "sick, dark, and unfeeling" (Poe's Cosmology). This rational side can be seen as a series of inevitable constants: despair, pain, materialism and death. In “The Masque of the Red Death,” the fatal “Red Death” ravages Prospero’s country and infects the people with “acute pains… profuse bleeding… [and] convulsions” (Poe 62). Prospero tries to exclude the plague from his life, but during his big party, the “presence of a masked figure” appears; “Neither wit nor propriety exist” in this character, dressed “in the clothes of the grave” (Poe 65). The Red Death is devoid of any ".