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26. Practical Directions.-The following practical directions on this subject should be observed:

(1.) Let the allusion spring up spontaneously from a thought in the mind, and not be laboriously sought by consulting a cyclopædia simply for the occasion.

(2.) Let the allusion be appropriate, and really add force or beauty to the sentiment.

(3.) Let it be suited to the occasion, and be drawn from subjects familiar to the persons addressed, and not degrade nor elevate the sentiment inappropriately.

(4.) If it is obscure, interpose a word of explanation so that it may be understood.

Abundant information, a prerequisite to genuine eloquence, will exhibit itself largely in comparisons and allusions.

CHAPTER IV..

METAPHORS.

27. Definitions and Examples.-A METAPHOR is an implied comparison. One great source of the power of a metaphor is its condensation.

Every trope may be regarded as a metaphor, but there are metaphors that can not be called tropes. A trope consists of a single expression, a metaphor may consist of many words.

In a metaphor the words-whether used literally or not-actually suggest a conception different from their original signification. In a trope one word is used in a figurative sense; in a metaphor the idea expressed by the whole sentence is to be understood in a figurative sense.

The sentence "Sin, though sometimes sweet, is always bitter," contains two tropes, sweet and bitter being used out of their natural sense. But Dr. South, speaking of sin, says: "Sin is bitter-sweet; the fine colors of the serpent by no means make amends for the poison of his sting."

This last sentence, though true literally, is also true figuratively, and it is the figurative sense attached to it that makes it a metaphor. In this sense it means that, just as the fine colors of a serpent will not

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make amends for the poison of his sting, so the pleasures of sin will not recompense for its punishment.

28. Metaphors resolvable into Comparisons.-Every metaphor may be resolved into a comparison, but the use of a metaphor does not always imply a clear conception of the comparison.

The analogy or likeness between two things or actions may be so striking that the language which literally describes the first may also suggest the second, and a man may use the language to describe the second, without having any thought of the first. When one says, "The sun has retired to rest for the night," the hearer may not think that, "as a weary man retires to his bed, so the sun has disappeared in the west," but he would simply think-the sun has set.

"Petrarch relighted the torch of ancient learning." Here is presented the idea of a man lighting a torch that had been extinguished: as it is a "torch of ancient learning," we think of Petrarch as studying, editing, and publishing the writings of the Greek and Roman authors, which had been for some time forgotten, till he brought them once more to public notice.

Generally, when a metaphor is used, the meaning of it is easily perceived without the necessity of resolving it into a formal comparison, and without any consciousness that it implies a comparison.

An illustration of the condensation of a comparison into a metaphor is given by Spence, as follows: "As, in passing through the crystal, beams of white light are decomposed into the colors of the rainbow, so, in traversing the soul of the poet, the colorless rays of

truth are transformed into brightly-tinted poetry." Condensed into a metaphor, it becomes: "The white light of truth, in traversing the many-sided transparent soul of the poet, is refracted into iris-hued poetry."

29. Examples of Metaphors.—The following is from the speech of Daniel Webster at the laying of the corner-stone of Bunker Hill Monument, June 17, 1825:

"When the battle of Bunker Hill was fought, the existence of South America was scarcely felt in the civilized world. Borne down by colonial subjugation, monopoly, and bigotry, those regions of the South were hardly visible above the horizon. But in our day there has been, as it were, a new creation. The southern hemisphere emerges from the sea. Its lofty mountains begin to lift themselves into the light of heaven; its broad and fertile plains stretch out in beauty to the eye of civilized man, and at the mighty bidding of the voice of political liberty the waters of darkness retire."

The following is a good metaphor from the writings. of the Rev. Dr. Bethune:

"The giant, man, long crushed by usurpers of divine right, is flinging off the Etna from his mangled breast. His limbs are not yet drawn from under the quaking, and groaning, fire-spouting mass."

Rev. Dr. Olin said:

"Into this turbid maelstrom (party strife), from which virtue and conscience never come forth without a stain, good but ambitious men, of facile morality and feeble purposes, are ever ready to plunge."

Rev. Dr. A. P. Stanley, speaking of the Bible, says:

"The Psalter alone, by its manifold applications and uses in after times, is a vast palimpsest,* written over and over again, illuminated, illustrated, by every conceivable incident and emotion of men and of nations: battles, wanderings, dangers, escapes, death-beds, obsequies, of many ages and countries, rise, or may rise, to our view, as we read it."

A parchment written over the second time, with the first writing not erased.

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30. The Object of Metaphors, and when they should be employed. The object of metaphors is to express thought that plain language can not express, and also to express thought and emotion more forcibly and impressively than literal language can express them.

Metaphors should be suited both in frequency and character to the nature of the subject treated. In a strictly didactic or scientific writing, the frequent use of metaphors would be improper and offensive. In such a work as "Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding" no striking metaphors are found, while the tropes employed are usually those which had become so common as not to attract attention as figurative language. Statutes, deeds, wills, and all legal documents, in which precision is of the utmost consequence, should avoid metaphorical language. In the Declaration of Independence, the style of which is eminently suited to its gravity and value, a few common tropes occur, but not a single metaphor. Metaphors in such a paper would betray a want of high culture and of correct taste in its writer.

In narratives they are proper, particularly when any thoughts of more than ordinary consequence are presented, or when excitement or passion is represented.

Historians use them to impart vivacity to style. A striking conception is thus presented by Gibbon:

"Instead of a statue cast in a single mould by the hand of an artist, the works of Justinian represent a tessellated pavement of antique and costly fragments."

The following is a good metaphor from Bancroft's "History of the United States:"