that they too will sometimes be effected by it we have no reaBon to question. That in those metonymies, in particular, of which some instances have been given, wherein the connexion may be justly accounted more imaginary than real, such changes in the application should arise, might naturally be expected. The transition from the figurative to the proper, in regard to such terms as are in daily use, is indeed inevitable. The word vessel in English hath doubtless been at first introduced by a synecdoche to signify a ship, the genus for the species, but is now become by use as much a proper term in this signification as the word ship itself.

With regard to metaphor, it is certain that, in all languages, there are many words which at first had one sense only, and afterward acquired another by metaphorical application, of which words both senses are now become so current that it would be difficult for any but an etymologist to determine which is the original and which the metaphorical. Of this kind in the English tongue are the substantives conception, apprehension, expression; the first of these, conception, when it notes an action of the mind, and when the beginning of pregnancy in a female, is alike supported by use; the second and third terms, apprehension for seizure, and expression for squeezing out, are now rather uncommon. Yet these are doubtless the primitive significations.

It may be farther remarked, that in some words the metaphorical sense has jostled out the original sense altogether, so that in respect of it they are become obsolete. Of this kind in our tongue are the verbs to train, to curb, to edify, to embrace, the primitive significations whereof were to draw, to bend, to build, to lift. And if one should now speak of the acuteness of a razor or of the ardour of a fire, we could not say that to a linguist he would speak unintelligibly, but by every man of sense he would be thought to express himself both pedantically and improperly. The word ruminate, though good in the metaphorical sense, to denote musing on a subject, would scarcely be admitted, except in poetry, in the literal sense, for chewing the cud. Thus it happens with languages as with countries; strangers received at first through chariity, often in time grow strong enough to dispossess the natives.

Now, in regard to all the words which fall under the two last remarks, whatever they were formerly, or in whatever light they may be considered by the grammarian and the lexicographer, they cannot be considered as genuine metaphors by the rhetorician. I have already assigned the reason. They have nothing of the effect of metaphor upon the hearer. On the contrary, like proper terms, they suggest directly to his mind, without the intervention of any image, the ideas which the speaker proposed to convey by them.

From all that hath been said, it evidently follows, that those metaphors which hold mostly of the thought, that is, those to which the ear hath not been too much familiarized, have most of the peculiar vivacity resulting from this trope; the inva riable effect of very frequent use being to convert the metaphorical into a proper meaning. A metaphor hath undoubt edly the strongest effect when it is first ushered into the lan guage; but by reason of its peculiar boldness, this, as was hinted already, is rarely to be hazarded. I may say it ought never to be hazarded, unless when both the perspicuity is secured to an ordinary understanding by the connexion, and the resemblance suggested is very striking. A new metaphor (and the same holds, though in a lower degree, of every trope) is never regarded with indifference. If it be not a beauty, it is a blemish. Besides, the more a language advanceth in richness and precision, and the more a spirit of criticism prevails among those who speak it, the more delicate the people become in this respect, and the more averse to the admission of new metaphors. It is even proper it should be so, there not being the same plea of necessity in such languages as in those that are but poorly supplied with words. Hence it is that, in modern times, the privilege of coining these tropes is almost confined to poets and orators; and as to the latter, they can hardly ever be said to have this indulgence, unless when they are wrought up to a kind of enthusiasm by their subject. Hence, also, have arisen those qualifying phrases in discourse, which, though so common in Greek and Latin, as well as in modern languages, are rarely, If ever, to be met with either in the rudest or in the most ancient tongues. These are, so to speak, If I may thus express myself, and the like.

I cannot help remarking, before I conclude this article of the origin of tropes, and of the changes they undergo through the gradual operation of custom, that critics ought to show more reserve and modesty than they commonly do in pronouncing either on the fitness or on the beauty of such as occur sometimes in ancient authors. For, first, it ought to be observed (as may be collected from what has been shown above), that the less enlightened a nation is, their language will of necessity the more abound in tropes, and the people will be the less shy of admitting those which have but a remote connexion with the things they are employed to denote. Again, it ought to be considered that many words which must appear as tropical to a learner of a distant age, who acquires the language by the help of grammars and dictionaries, may, through the imperceptible influence of use, have totally lost that appearance to the natives, who consider them purely as proper terms. A stranger will be apt to mistake a grammati cal for a rhetorical trope, or even an accidental homonymy

for a far-fetched figure. Lastly, it ought to be remembered how much the whole of this matter is everywhere under the dominion of caprice, and how little the figurative part of the language of any people is susceptible of a literal translation, that will be accounted tolerable, into the language of any other. If these things were properly attended to, I imagine we should, on these subjects, be more diffident of our own judgment, and, consequently, less captious and decisive.

So much for the nature of tropes in general, and those universal principles on which in every tongue their efficacy depends; and so much for the distinction naturally consequent on those principles into grammatical tropes and tropes rhetorical.

PART II The different Sorts of Tropes conducive to Vivacity. I now consider severally the particular ways wherein rhetorical tropes may be rendered subservient to vivacity.

1. THE LESS FOR THE MORE GENERAL.

The first way I shall mention is when, by means of the trope, a species is aptly represented by an individual, or a genus by a species. I begin with this, because it comes nearest that speciality in the use of proper terms, from which, as was evinced already, their vivacity chiefly results. Of the individual for the species I shall give an example from our celebrated satirist, Mr. Pope :

May some choice patron bless each gray goose quill!
May ev'ry Bavius have his Bufo still!"*

Here, by a beautiful antonomasia, Bavius, a proper name, is made to represent one whole class of men; Bufo, also a proper name (it matters not whether real or fictitious), is made to represent another class. By the former is meant every bad poet, by the latter every rich fool who gives his patronage to such. As what precedes in the Essay secures the perspicuity (and in introducing tropes of this kind, especially new ones, it is necessary that the perspicuity be thus secured), it was impossible in another manner to express the sentiment with equal vivacity.

There is also a sort of antonomasia to which use hath long ago given her sanction, and which, therefore, needs not to be introduced with much precaution. Such is the following application of famous names: a Solomon for a wise man, a Croesus for a rich man, a Judas for a traitor, a Demosthenes for an orator, and a Homer for a poet. Nor do these want a share of vivacity, when apposite and properly managed.

That kind of synecdoche by which the species is put for the genus, is used but sparingly in our language. Examples,

* Prologue to the Satires.

however, occur sometimes, as when an assassin is termed a cut-throat, or a fiction a lie, as in these words of Dryden: "The cock and fox the fool and knave imply,

The truth is moral, though the tale a lie.'

In like manner, slaughter, especially in battle, is by poets sometimes denominated murder, and legal prosecution persecution. Often, in these instances, the word may justly be said to be used without a figure. It may, however, in general, be affirmed of all those terms, that they are more vivid and forcible for this single reason, because they are more special.

There is one species of the onomatopeia which very much resembles the antonomasia just now taken notice of. It is when a verb is formed from a proper name, in order to express some particular action for which the person to whom the name belonged was remarkable. An example of this we have in the instructions which Hamlet gave the players who were to act his piece before the king and the queen. He mentioned his having seen some actors who in their way outheroded Herod, intimating that by the outrageous gestures they used in the representation they overacted even the fury and violence of that tyrant. This trope hath been admirably imitated by Swift, who says concerning Blackmore, the author of a translation of some of the Psalms into English verse, "Sternhold himself he out-sternholded."

How languid in comparison of this would it have been to say, that in Sternhold's own manner Sir Richard outdid him. But it must be owned that this trope, the onomatopeia, in any form whatever, hath little scope in our tongue, and is hardly admissible except in burlesque.

2. THE MOST INTERESTING CIRCUMSTANCE DISTINGUISHED. The second way I shall take notice of, wherein the use of tropes may conduce to vivacity, is when the trope tends to fix the attention on that particular of the subject which is most interesting, or on which the action related, or fact referred to, immediately depends. This bears a resemblance to the former method; for by that an individual serves to exhibit a species, and a species a genus; by this a part is made to represent the whole, the abstract, as logicians term it, to suggest the concrete, the passion its object, the operation its subject, the instrument the agent, and the gift the giver. The tropes which contribute in this way to invigorate the expression are these two, the synecdoche and the metonymy.

For an illustration of this in the synecdoche, let it be ob served, that by this trope the word hand is sometimes used for man, especially one employed in manual labour. Now in such expressions as the following,

"All hands employ'd, the royal work grows warm,' ""*

it is obvious, from the principles above explained, that the trope contributes to vivacity, and could not be with equal advantage supplied by a proper term. But in such phrases as these, "One of the hands fell overboard"-" All our hands were asleep," it is ridiculous, as what is affirmed hath no particular relation to the part specified. The application of tropes in this undistinguishing manner is what principally characterizes the contemptible cant of particular professions. I shall give another example. A sail with us frequently denotes a ship. Now to say "We descried a sail at a distance," hath more vivacity than to say "We descried a ship," because, in fact, the sail is that part which is first discovered by the eye; but to say "Our sails ploughed the main," instead of "Our ships ploughed the main,” would justly be accounted nonsensical, because what is metaphorically termed ploughing the main is the immediate action of the keel, a very different part of the vessel. To produce but one other instance, the word roof is emphatically put for house in the following quotation:

"Return to her? and fifty men dismiss'd?
No; rather I abjure all roofs, and choose
To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,
To wage against the enmity o' th' air
Necessity's sharp pinch."†

The notion of a house as a shelter from the inclemencies of the sky, alluded to in these lines, directly leads the imagination to form a more vivid idea of that part of the building which is over our headst

It was observed that the metonymy also contributes in this

* Dryden.

† Shakspeare's Lear.

The Latin example quoted from Tully in a note on the first part of this section affords a good illustration of this doctrine: "Cujus latus ille mucro petebat?" Mucro for gladius, the point for the weapon, is in this place a trope particularly apposite. From the point the danger immediately proceeds; to it, therefore, in any assault, the eye both of the assailant and of the assailed are naturally directed: of the one that he may guide it aright, and of the other that he may avoid it. Consequently, on it the imagination will fix, as on that particular which is the most interesting, because on it the event directly depends; and wherever the expression thus happily assists the fancy by coinciding with its natural bent, the sentiment is exhibited with vivacity. We may remark by the way, that the specifying of the part aimed at, by saying Cujus latus, and not simply quem, makes the expression still more graphical. Yet latus here is no trope, else it had been Quod latus, not Cujus latus. But that we may conceive the difference between such a proper use of tropes as is here exemplified, and such an injudicious use as noway tends to enliven the expression, let us suppose the orator had intended to say "he held a sword in his hand." If, instead of the proper word, he had employed the synecdoche, and said "mucronem manu tenebat," he would have spoken absurdly, and counteracted the bent of the fancy, which in this instance leads the attention to the hilt of the sword, not to the point.