of expression.

By their means, words and phrases are multiplied, so that all kinds of ideas, the minutest differences, and the nicest shades of thought, can be distinctly and accurately expressed.

(b). They dignify style. When treating of dignified or elevated subjects we should be greatly at a loss for suitable words were it not for figures.

Notice the difference of dignity between the following expressions ;-

(I). Literally: Figuratively:

(II). Literally:

Figuratively:

The sun rises.

But yonder comes the powerful king of day,

Rejoicing in the East.

All men are subject to death.

With equal steps, impartial Fate Knocks at the palace and the cottage gate.

(c). They bring before the mind two objects simultaneously yet without confusion. When, for youth we substitute the morning of life, the fancy is entertained with two ideas at once,--the early period of existence, and the opening of the day; each of which has its own associations, and awakens its peculiar train of images. The fancy is thus excited in a two-fold degree; and this double pleasure is greatly enhanced by the evident resemblance between the objects compared.

(d). Figures frequently convey the meaning more clearly

and forcibly than plain language. This is particularly true in the case of abstract ideas, which, in a greater or less degree, figures represent as concrete objects, surrounding them with such circumstances as enable the mind fully to understand them.

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But it must not be supposed that the frequent use of figures is absolutely essential to beauty of composition, or that figures alone, without other merits, can constitute such beauty. No figure can render a cold or empty composition interesting; while, on the other hand, if a sentence is sublime or pathetic, it can support itself without borrowed assistance.

Rhetoricians have distinguished between Figures and Tropes; a trope being a single word used figuratively, or not in its literal meaning; while a figure is an entire expression converted from its proper signification to another, in order to give greater force.

A classification of the more important Figures may (says Professor Bain) be based on the operations of Intellect, or Understanding, that they have reference to. Now our intellectual powers are reducible to three simple modes of working;—

(a). Discrimination, or Feeling of Difference, Contrast.

It means that the mind is affected by change, as in passing from rest to motion, from cold to heat, from light to dark; and that the greater and more sudden the change, the stronger is the effect. The figure, called Antithesis or Contrast, derives its force from this fact.

(b) Similarity, or the Feeling of Agreement.

This

signifies that when like objects come under our notice, we are impressed by the circumstance, as when we see the resemblance of a child to its parent. The figures named Simile, Metaphor, Allegory, come under this head.

(c). Retentiveness, or Contiguity. The ability to retain successive impressions without confusion, and to bring them up afterwards, distinguishes mind; it is a power

fmiliarly known by the name Memory. Now tho chief way that Retentiveness, or Memory, works is this; impressions occurring together, become associated together, as sunrise with daylight; and when we are made to think of one we are reminded of the accompaniments. Hence the mental association of things contiguously placed, is a prominent fact of the mind; and one of its many consequences is that we often name a thing by some one of its adjuncts; as, the throne for the sovereign; gold for wealth. Such is the nature of the figure called Metonymy

12. We shall now proceed to discuss the Figures of Rhetoric in the following order ;

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(a). Figures of Similarity:-Simile or Comparison Metaphor; Personification; Allegory; Synecdoche (partly).

(b). Figures of Contiguity:-Metonymy; Synecdoche (partly).

(c). Figures of Contrast:-Antithesis.

(d). Other important Figui es :--Epigram; Hyperb le; Climax; Interrogation; Exclamation; Apostrophe; Ircny; Vision; Apophasis.

The following remarks are applicable to similitudes generally;--

(a). In composition, similitudes are made use of to render the subjects more intelligible. If any subject is imperfectly understood by us, one mode of assisting the mind is to bring forward, as an illustration, something of the same kind that we already understand. Thus, the action of the heart, which is concealed from our view, may be made intelligible by comparison with a force-pump.

(b). A Resemblance is not a Figure of Speech, unless

the things compared be different in kind. The object compared should be alike in some respects, and different in many others; and the greater both the likeness and the difference are, the more pleasing will' the comparison be. Thus the comparison of Napoleon to Caesar is literal and not figurative; the comparison. of a great conqueror to a destructive conflagration or a tempest is of the nature of a figure.

(c } In Oratory and Poetry similitudes are used in order to add intensity or impressiveness to the meaning, Sir Philip Sydney says of the ballad of Chevy Chase, "It stirs the heart like the sound of a trumpet.. Chaucer thus describes the Squire ;

(a).

"Embroided was he, as it were a mead,

As full of freshe floures white and rede;
Singing he was, or fluting all the day;
He was as fresh as is the month of May."

Some similitudes are called picturesque, because they enable us to picture an object vividly to the mind. Thus from Chaucer,

With lockes crull, as they were laid in press." (e). Old used-up similitudes should be avoided. However beautiful these may once have been, frequent use has divested them of all their charm. On the other

hand, original comparisons cause an agreeable surprise, even though they do little to explain a subject or to excite livelier feelings in connexion with it.

(f). When figures of similarity are used to give intelligibility and clearness, they must satisfy the following conditions ;

(I). The resemblance should turn on the important circumstance. Nothing is gained by comparing objects to things respecting which very little is

known. To be effective, the object to which comparison is made must be familiar to the reader,— one of which, if not personally known to him, he has at least a well-defined conception. Still less should similitudes be founded on faint similarities. In this case, they neither explain nor embellish, and instead of entertaining the mind distract and perplex it.

(II). The figure employed should be more impressive

than the original. Similitudes must not be drawn from low or trivial objects. Figures so derived degrade style instead of adorning it. Hence the following is weak;

"As wasps provoked by children in their play,

Pour from their mansions by the broad highway,
In swarms the guiltless traveller engage,

Whet all their stings, and call forth all their rage;

Thus from the tents the fervent legion swarms,

So loud their clamors, and so keen their arms."

It is surely degrading to an army of heroes to compare them with a swarm of wasps.

(III). Small or trivial objects, on the other hand,

should not be compared with others far exceeding them in greatness. Hence the following passage is weak;--

"Loud as a bull makes hill and valley ring,

So roared the lock when it released the spring." (g). Comparisons should be neither obvious nor trite. (h). Comparisons should not be so frequent as to weary

the mind; for, like all other good things, they may by superabundance become deformities.

(i). Similitudes are out of place when anger, terror,