It is of great importance to make youth obferve, in reading good authors, the use which true eloquence makes of figures; the affiftance it draws from them, not only to please, but to perfuade and move the affections, and that, without them, expreffion is weak, and falls into a kind of monotony, and is almoft like a body without a foul. Quintilian gives us a just idea of them by a very natural comparison. A statue, fays he, quite uniform, and of a piece from top to bottom, with the head ftraight upon the fhoulders, the arms hanging down, and the feet joined together, would have no gracefulness, and would feem to be without motion, and lifelefs. It is the different attitudes of the feet, the hands, the countenance, and head, which being varied an infinite number of ways, according to the diverfity of fubjects, communicate a fort of action and motion to the works of art, and give them, as it were, life and foul. Figures of Words. The metaphor is a figure which fubftitutes the figurative terms it borrows from other subjects, as it were by a kind of exchange, in the room of proper words, which are either wanting, or have not energy enough. Thus gemma was called the bud of the vine, there being no proper word to express it: incenfusira, inflammatus furore, were ufed inftead of o Recti corporis vel minima gratia eft. Neque enim adverfa fit facies, & demiffa brachia, & juncti pedes & à fummis ad ima rigens opus. Flexus ille, & ut fic dixerim, motus, dat actum quendam effictis. Jdeo nec ad unum modum formatæ manus, & in vulta mille (pecies... Quam quidem gratiam & delectationem afferunt figuræ, quæque in fenfibus, quæque in verbis funt. Quint. I, 2. c. 14. p Tertius ille modus transferendi verbi late patet, quem ne iratus, furens, in order to paint the effect of those pations the better. We fee by this, that what there was at first invented through neceffity, from the defect or want of proper words, has fince contributed towards embellishing fpeech; much after the fame manner that clothes were at firft employed to cover the body, and defend it against the cold, and served afterwards to adorn it. Every metaphor therefore muft either find a void in the place it is to fill up, or at leaft (in cafe it banishes a proper word), must have more force than the word to which it is substituted. This is one of the figures that gives moft ornament, ftrength, and grandeur to difcourfe; and the reader may have obferved in the feveral paffages I have cited, that the most exquifite expreffions are generally metaphorical, and derive all their merit from that figure. Indeed, it has the peculiar advantage, according to Quintilian's obfervation, to fhine from its own light in the most celebrated pieces, and to distinguish itself most in them: it inriches a language, in fome measure, by an infinity of expreffions, by fubftituting the figurative in the room of the fimple or plain; it throws a great variety into the ftyle: it raises and aggrandifes the most minute and common things; it gives us great pleasure by the ingenious boldness, with which it ftrikes out in queft of foreign expreffions, inftead of the natural ones which are at hand; it deceives the mind agreeably, by fhewing it one thing, and meaning another. In fine, it gives a body, q Metaphora aut vacantem occupare locum debet; aut, fi in alienum veni, plus valere eo quod expellit. Quintil. 1. 8. c. 6. Ita jucunda atque nitida, ut in oratione quamlibet clara, proprio tamen lumine eluceat. Quint, 1. 8. c. 6. 8 In fuorum verborum maxima copia, tamen homines aliena multo magis, fi funt ratione tranflata, delectant. Id accidere credo, vel if we may fo fay, to the moft fpirited things, and makes them almoft the objects of hearing and fight by the fenfible images it delineates to the imagination. In order to give an idea of the force of metaphors, great care muft be taken to begin always with explaining the plain and natural sense, upon which the figurative is founded, and without which the latter could not be well understood. The fureft and likewife the eafieft way to reprefent the beauty of a metaphor, and, in general, to explain the beautiful paffages in authors with juftness, is to fubftitute natural expreffions inftead of the figurative, and to diveft a very bright phrafe of all its ornaments, by reducing it to a fimple propofition. This was Cicero's method; and what better method can we follow? He explains the force and energy of a metaphorical expreffion in these verses of an antient poet : Vive, Ulyffes, dum licet: Oculis poftremum lumen radiatum rape. t He performs it thus: Non dixit cape, non pete; haberet enim moram fperantis diutius effe fefe victurum : fed rape. Hoc verbum eft ad id aptatum, quod ante dixerat, dum licet. Horace uses the fame thought: "Dona præfentis cape lætus hora. An able interpreter afferts, that we must read rape inftead of cape. I doubt whether he be not in the right; for the man pourtrayed by Horace is one who is free from all care and uneafinefs; and, by flattering himself with the hopes of a long life, enjoys peaceably the pleasures which each day affords; and the word cape agrees very well with fuch a condition; whereas, in the antient poet, Ulyffes is exhorted to lay hold of the prefent moments, left they fhould efcape him, and he be deprived of them by a fudden and unexLib. 3. de Orat, n. 162, ■ Ode 8. 1. 3. pectea W Que pected death, Poftremum lumen radiatum rape. Cicero employed a word like this full as gracefully: quifque eft folertior & ingeniofior, hoc docet iracundius &laboriofius. Quod enim ipfe celeriter arripuit: id cum tarde percipi videt, difcruciatur. It is enough to obferve, that he does not fay facile didicit, but celeriter arripuit; the difference is very obvious. When the metaphor is continued, and does not confift in one word, it is called an Allegory: Equidem cæteras tempeflates & procellas in illis duntaxat fluctibus concionum femper Miloni putavi effe fubeundas. He might have faid plainly, Equidem multa pericula in populi concionibus femper Miloni putavi effe fubeunda. * Remember the beginning and progress of the war, suhich, though but a spark in the beginning, now fets all Europe in a flame. Thofe clouds which arise from diflike or suspicion, never appeared in bis ferene countenance. His virtues made him known to the public, and produced that first flower of reputation, which spreads an edour the more agreeable than perfumes, over every other part of a glorious life. z When we use this figure, we must always obferve to continue the fimile, and not fally abruptly from one image to another; nor, for example, conclude with a conflagration, after we began with a storm: Horace is charged with that error in this line : Et male tornatos incudi reddere versus. Where he joins two ideas widely different, the turning wheel, and the anvil. But fome interpreters excuse him. I know not whether Cicero may not be charged Pro Quint. Rofc. n. 31. * M Flêchier. y Melius eft nomen bonum,quam unguenta pretiofa. Ecclef, vii. 2. z Id imprimis eft cuftodiendum, at quo ex genere cœperis tranfla ticnis, hoc definas. Multi enim. cum initium à tempeftate fumpferunt, incendio aut ruina finiunt, quæ eft inconfequentia rerum fœ. diffima, Quintil. lib, 8. c, 6. with the fame fault in this paffage of the fecond book de Orat. Ut cum in fole ambulem, etiamfi ob aliam caufam ambulem, fieri tamen natura ut colorer: fic, cum iftos libros ad Mifenum ftudiofus legerim, fentio orationem meam illorum quafi cantu colorari. How can we reconcile these two words, cantu and colorari? and what relation can there be between cantus and a piece of writing? The periphrafis or circumlocution. This figure is fometimes abfolutely neceffary, as when we speak of things which decency will not allow us to exprefs in their own names; zad requifita natura. It is often used for ornament only, which is very common with poets; and fometimes to express a thing the more magnificently, which would otherwife appear very low and mean; or to cover or foften the harshness of fome propofitions, which would be shocking, if fhewn in a naked and fimple drefs. 1. For Ornament. a The King, in order to give an immortal teflimony of his esteem and friendship for that great general (M. de Turenne), gives an illuftrious place to his renowned afbes, among thofe lords of the earth, who still preferve, in the magnificence of their tombs, an image of that of their thrones; instead of faying fimply, gives his afhes, a place in the tombs of the Kings. C'eft-là ce qui l'emporte aux lieux où naît l'aurore, Où le Perfe eft brûle de l'aftre qu'il adore. Englished: ""Tis this tranfports him to far diftant climes, ] y Lib. 2. de Orat. n. 6o. Sallust, H a Mafcaron. 2. To |