from the object to which it properly belongs to other objects which strike the mind as in some way or other participating in the peculiarities of the first object. The mental process which gave to the root mar the meaning of to propitiate was no other than this, that men perceived some analogy between the smooth surface produced by rubbing and polishing and the smooth expression of countenance, the smoothness of voice, and the calmness of looks produced even in an enemy by kind and gentle words. Thus, when we speak of a crane, we apply the name of a bird to an engine. People were struck with some kind of similarity between the longlegged bird picking up his food with his long beak and their rude engines for lifting weights. In Greek, too, géranos has both meanings. This is metaphor. Again, cutting remarks, glowing words, fervent prayers, slashing articles, all are metaphor. Spiritus in Latin meant originally blowing, or wind. But when the principle of life within man or animal had to be named, its outward sign, namely, the breath of the mouth, was naturally chosen to express it. Hence in Sanskrit asu, breath and life; in Latin spiritus, breath and life. Again, when it was perceived that there was something else to be named, not, the mere animal life, but that which was supported by this animal life, the same word was chosen, in the Modern Latin dialects, to express the spiritual as opposed to the mere material or animal element in man. All this is metaphor.

We read in the Veda, ii. 3, 4:1-" Who saw the first-born when he who had no form (lit. bones) 1 M. M., History of Sanskrit Literature, p. 20.

R

bore him that had form? Where was the life (asuḥ), the blood (asrik), the self (âtmâ) of the earth? Who went to ask this from any that knew it?"

Here breath, blood, self, are so many attempts at expressing what we should call cause.

But let us now consider for a moment that what philosophers, and particularly Locke, have pointed out as a peculiarity of certain words, such as to apprehend, to comprehend, to understand, to fathom, to imagine, spirit, and angel, must have been, in reality, a peculiarity of a whole period in the early history of speech. No advance was possible in the intellectual life of man without metaphor. Most roots that have yet been discovered, had originally a material meaning, and a meaning so general and comprehensive 1 that they could easily be applied to many special objects. We meet with roots meaning to strike, to shine, to creep, to grow, to fall, but we never meet with primitive roots expressive of states or actions that do not fall under the cognizance of the senses, nor even with roots expressive of such special acts as "raining, thundering, hailing, sneezing, trying, helping." Yet Language has been a very good housewife to her husband, the human Mind; she has made very little go a long way. With a very small store of such material roots as we just mentioned, she has furnished decent clothing for the numberless offspring of the Mind, leaving no idea, no sentiment unprovided for, except, perhaps, the few which, as we are told by some poets, are inexpressible.

1 The specialization of general roots is more common than the general. ization of special roots, though both processes must be admitted.

Thus from roots meaning to shine, to be bright, G names were formed for sun, moon, stars, the eyes of man, gold, silver, play, joy, happiness, love. With roots meaning to strike, it was possible to name an axe, the thunderbolt, a fist, a paralytic stroke, a striking remark, and a stroke of business. From roots meaning to go, names were derived for clouds, for ivy, for creepers, serpents, cattle and chattel, movable and immovable property. With a root meaning to crumble, expressions were formed for sickness and death, for evening and night, for old age and for the fall of the year.

We must now endeavor to distinguish between two kinds of metaphor, which I call radical and poetical. I call it radical metaphor when a root which means to shine is applied to form the names, not only of the fire or the sun, but of the spring of the year, the morning light, the brightness of thought, or the joyous outburst of hymns of praise. Ancient languages are brimful of such metaphors, and under the microscope of the etymologist every word almost discloses traces of its first metaphorical conception.

From this we must distinguish poetical metaphor, namely, when a noun or verb, ready made and assigned to one definite object or action, is transferred poetically to another object or action. For instance, when the rays of the sun are called the hands or fingers of the sun, the noun which means hand or finger existed ready made, and was, as such, transferred poetically to the stretched-out rays of the sun. By the same process the clouds are called mountains, the rain-clouds are spoken of as cows with heavy

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udders, the thunder-cloud as a goat or as a goatskin, the sun as a horse, or as a bull, or as a giant bird, the lightning as an arrow, or as a serpent.

What applies to nouns, applies likewise to verbs. A verb such as "to give birth" is used, for instance, of the night producing, or, more correctly, preceding the day, as well as of the day preceding the night. The sun, under one name, is said to beget the dawn, because the approach of daylight gives rise to the dawn; under another name the sun is said to love the dawn, because he follows her as a bridegroom follows after his bride; and lastly, the sun is said to destroy the dawn, because the dawn disappears as soon as the sun has risen. From another point of view the dawn may be said to give birth to the sun, because the sun seems to spring from her lap; she may be said to die or disappear after having given birth to her brilliant son, because as soon as the sun is born, the dawn must vanish. All these metaphors, however full of contradictions, were perfectly intelligible to the ancient poets, though to our modern understanding they are frequently riddles difficult to solve. We read in the Rig-Veda (x. 189),1 where the sunrise is described, that the dawn comes near to the sun, and breathes her last when the sun draws his first breath. The commentators indulge in the most fanciful explanations of this expression, without suspecting the simple conception of the poet, which after all is very natural.

Let us consider, then, that there was, necessarily and really, a period in the history of our race when all the thoughts that went beyond the narrow horizon

1 See M. M., Die Todtenbestattung der Brahmanen, p.

xi.

of our every-day life had to be expressed by means of metaphors, and that these metaphors had not yet become what they are to us, mere conventional and traditional expressions, but were felt and understood half in their original and half in their modified character. We shall then perceive that such a period of thought and speech must be marked by features very different from those of any later age.

One of the first results would naturally be that objects in themselves quite distinct, and originally conceived as distinct by the human intellect, would nevertheless receive the same name. If there was a root meaning to shine forth, to revive, to gladden, that root might be applied to the dawn, as the burst of brightness after the dark night, to a spring of water, gushing forth from the rock and gladdening the heart of the traveller, and to the spring of the year, that awakens the earth after the death-like rest of winter. The spring of the year, the spring of water, the day-spring, would thus go by the same name, they would be what Aristotle calls homony-✔ mous or namesakes. On the other hand, the same object might strike the human mind in various ways. The sun might be called the warming and generating, but likewise the scorching and killing; the sea might be called the barrier as well as the bridge and the high-road of commerce; the clouds might be spoken of as bright cows with heavy udders, or as dark and roaring demons. Every day that dawns in the morning might be called the twin of the night that follows the day, or all the days of the year might be called brothers, or so many head of cattle which are driven to their heavenly pasture every