_Subjects expressed figuratively._
1. A word proper to one subject employed figuratively to express a
resembling subject.
There is no figure of speech so frequent, as what is derived from the
relation of resemblance. Youth, for example, is signified figuratively
by the _morning_ of life. The life of a man resembles a natural day in
several particulars. The morning is the beginning of day, youth the
beginning of life: the morning is chearful, so is youth; &c. By another
resemblance, a bold warrior is termed the _thunderbolt_ of war; a
multitude of troubles, a _sea_ of troubles.
No other figure of speech possesses so many different beauties, as that
which is founded on resemblance. Beside the beauties above mentioned,
common to all sorts, it possesses in particular the beauty of a metaphor
or of a simile. A figure of speech built upon resemblance, suggests
always a comparison betwixt the principal subject and the accessory; and
by this means every good effect of a metaphor or simile, may, in a short
and lively manner, be produced by this figure of speech.
2. A word proper to the effect employ’d figuratively to express the
cause.
_Lux_ for the sun. _Shadow_ for cloud. A helmet is signified by the
expression _glittering terror_. A tree by _shadow_ or _umbrage_. Hence
the expression,
Nec habet Pelion umbras.
_Ovid._
Where the dun umbrage hangs.
_Spring, l. 1023._
A wound is made to signify an arrow:
Vulnere non pedibus te consequar.
_Ovid._
There is a peculiar force and beauty in this figure. The word which
signifies figuratively the principal subject, denotes it to be a cause
by suggesting the effect.
3. A word proper to the cause, employ’d figuratively to express the
effect.
_Boumque labores_ for corn. _Sorrow_ or _grief_ for tears.
Again Ulysses veil’d his pensive head,
Again unmann’d, a show’r of _sorrow_ shed.
Streaming _Grief_ his faded cheek bedew’d.
_Blindness_ for darkness:
Cæcis erramus in undis.
_Æneid. iii. 200._
There is a peculiar energy in this figure similar to that in the former.
The figurative name denotes the subject to be an effect by suggesting
its cause.
4. Two things being intimately connected, the proper name of the one
employ’d figuratively to signify the other.
_Day_ for light. _Night_ for darkness. Hence, A sudden night. _Winter_
for a storm at sea.
Interea magno misceri murmure pontum,
Emissamque Hyemem sensit Neptunus.
_Æneid. i. 128._
This last figure would be too bold for a British writer, as a storm at
sea is not inseparably connected with winter in this climate.
5. A word proper to an attribute employ’d figuratively to denote the
subject.
_Youth_ and _beauty_ for those who are young and beautiful:
Youth and beauty shall be laid in dust.
_Majesty_ for the King:
What art thou, that usurp’st this time of night,
Together with that fair and warlike form,
In which the _Majesty_ of buried Denmark
Did sometime march?
_Hamlet, act 1. sc. 1._
-------- Or have ye chosen this place,
After the toils of battle, to repose
Your weary’d _virtue_?
_Paradise Lost._
_Verdure_ for a green field. _Summer. l. 301._
Speaking of cranes:
To pigmy nations wounds and death they bring,
And all the _war_ descends upon the wing.
_Iliad_ iii. 10.
Cool _age_ advances venerably wise.
_Iliad_ iii. 149.
The peculiar beauty of this figure arises from suggesting an attribute
that embellishes the subject, or puts it in a stronger light.
6. A complex term employ’d figuratively to denote one of the component
parts.
_Funus_ for a dead body. _Burial_ for a grave.