While constructed from Greek roots, this word was coined by an English poet and philosopher, likely inspired by a German word, “ineinsbildung,” meaning “forming into one.” In Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s 1817 autobiography, “Biographia Literaria,” he formed “esemplastic” by combining the Greek phrase “es hen,” meaning “into one,” with the Greek word “plassein,” meaning “to mold.” This fulfilled his desire for a term that depicted the imagination’s ability to meld vastly different experiences into a unified form — such as crafting various sensations, images, and experiences into a poem.