Enoch, Elijah and the underworld heroes

Meaning

III.13 juxtaposes heavenly ascent with descent to the underworld. Enoch and Elijah mark the upward extreme; Orpheus, Hercules and Theseus mark celebrated journeys below. Their names enlarge the imagined reach of knowledge within Nature's house, whose hidden resources philosophy is said to unlock. Specifically, the person favoured by Heaven who obtains entry to Nature’s treasure chamber through philosophy’s key has reason to say that he has ascended and descended like these figures; it is a comparison attached to access, not the narrator’s travel claim.

The juxtaposition is analogical. It does not report that the author has repeated these journeys or instruct the reader to attempt a literal ascent or descent. Nor are the scriptural and mythological figures made identical in religious status. Their common local function is to mark otherwise inaccessible regions and to praise a philosophy that claims access to inward causes beyond the surface of ordinary life.