6. 7. 8. As, whence the sun 'gins his reflection, New honours come upon him, Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould, She never told her love, But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud, Exercise 28. Express the following simple ideas Metaphorically:1. He is the most distinguished man in his profession. 2. There are scenes in nature which are pleasant when we are sad, as well as when we are cheerful. 3. The ship's keel was turning up the waters. 4. The advance of time is little observed. 5. His happiness was very great. 6. The rich die as well as the poor. 7. Misery is the result of vice. 8. The most distinguished of the Scottish nobility fell around their king at Flodden. 9. Perfect taste knows how to unite nature with art, without destroying the simplicity of nature in the connection. 68. Personification,* which, like Simile and Metaphor, also * Metaphor and Personification are often confounded. For instance, in one of the best existing text-books the same sentence is given as an example, first of Metaphor, and afterwards of Personification: "The earth thirsts for rain." In determining how we are to distinguish between the two figures, it is necessary to remember that many words have acquired a metaphorical meaning, in which sense we often use them though quite unconscious of the figure they imply. Thus when we are speaking of a storm raging furiously, it is by no means present to our mind that rage and fury are feelings properly belonging only to human beings; and we do not therefore endow the storm with personality when we ascribe to it the action which these feelings imply. In short, it is raging that is here used in a figurative sense, and not "storm." So, when we speak of th "thirsty ground," we use the word thirsty (which primarily denotes a certain physical longing) in a secondary and spiritual sense; but the figure is in thirsty alone, and does not extend to "ground,' which it qualifies. Now the test of personality is gender, and the figure is that of Personification only when a masculine or feminine pronoun implies comparison, is that figure by which the lower animals and inanimate objects are endowed with the powers of human beings, specially with the power of speech; as, "The mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands." 69. Personification of the second person forms the figure Apostrophe,-wherein the inanimate and the absent are addressed as if they were present, as, "O death! where is thy sting?" Exercise 29. Write sentences in which the following subjects shall be Personified; and the first six Apostrophised: 70. Metonymy is the figure by which correlative terms are interchanged; as when, 1. A sign is put for the thing signified; as, the sceptre or the crown, for royalty; gray hairs, for age, &c. 2. An author for his works; as, "I am reading Shakespeare," meaning one of Shakespeare's works. 3. A vessel for its contents; as, "He drank the cup," for wine, or poison. 71. Synecdoche is the figure which puts a part for the whole, or the whole for a part; as, "Fifty sail," for fifty ships. Exercise 30. Select separately the examples of Metonymy and Synecdoche from the following, and shew the exact nature of the figure:— 1. Oh grave, where is thy victory? 2. The sceptre shall not depart from Judah. 3. His mill employs three hundred hands. 4. The country was devastated by the sword. 5. Consider the lilies how they grow. 6. No useless coffin enclosed his breast. 7. He reads Demos (I, thou, he, or she) can be put in its place. By this test, "earth" in the above expression is not personified; for we should more naturally "it thirsts," than either "he or she thirsts for rain." say, thenes in the morning, and Homer at night; during the day he is alternately a patron of the gun and of the rod. 8. The whole city came forth to meet him. 9. Fifty winters had gone over his head. 10. Constantine assumed the purple while in Britain. 11. He has three sons: one is studying for the church, another for the bar, and the third has gone to sea. 12. He invaded France with sixty thousand foot, and twelve thousand horse. Exercise 31. Write sentences introducing a Metonymy for each of the following expressions; Write sentences introducing a Synecdoche for each of the follow 72. The quality of Grace in language requires the avoidance of such words as offend good taste by affectation, vulgarity, or harshness. 73. Rules for Grace of language: I. Avoid the unnecessary use of foreign and unusual words or idioms. II. Avoid the use of vulgar, slang, and provincial expressions. III. Avoid harsh-sounding words. 74. It is not intended by the first of these rules to forbid altogether the introduction of foreign words, or quotations from foreign languages, but only such use of them as seems prompted by affectation or pedantry, and not by a desire to express clearly and intelligibly what one has to say. It may be that a foreign word expresses an idea more simply and tersely than a native word; if so, and if the word be within the knowledge of those the we address, it should by all means be used. Of course, law against the introduction of foreign idioms, and the use of obsolete words is indisputable, alike on grounds of expediency and of taste. The second and third laws are warnings not only against bad taste, but against that mistaken judgment which supposes that there lies in such expressions greater energy than in those which are purer and more idiomatic. Exercise 33. Point out the violations of the rules of Graceful language in the following sentences : 1. Straight again, when he went from her, she fell a-weeping and blubbering, looking ruefully on the matter. 2. He expresses, with almost a muliebris impotentia of language, a semi-official sympathy with the cause of freedom in Europe. 3. The secretary did not come up to the scratch till the close of the debate, when he more than insinuated that his master had put his foot in it. 4. Judge, good Christian reader, whether it be possible that he be any better than a beast, out of whose brutish, beastly mouth cometh such a form of blasphemy. 5. And then, as some satisfaction to the world, he put forth a satire against the wickedness of these blood-suckers, revealing the infernal lies and knavery that he was made privy to. 6. Many of them came readily on deck, and being down on their marrow bones, did not venture to rise till they were positively ordered to do so. 7. Malgré the weather, the meeting was both influential and agreeable. 8. The opusculum itself is an epitome of chemistry. 9. The intrepid virtuosi continued their efforts till a no less e machina deus than the police commissary himself made his appearance. 10. Dixon having contrived, with pettifogging ingenuity, to trump up a charge against the manager, the latter, in a rus in urbe condition, was left to shift for himself. 11. I left our young poet snivelling and sobbing behind the scenes, and cursing somebody that has deceived him. 12. The tournure of his ideas is thoroughly English. 13. This last and most base imputation he reserved, that he might throw it in his teeth after his whole armoury of invective and abuse seemed to be exhausted. 14. Such a dog-in-the-manger policy lent a good deal of vraisemblance to the statements of his opponents. 15. The sic volumus of the secretary and the commissioners superseded the directions contained in their patent. 16. Is it not grievous to see such a muck-worm spirit in one so highborn and influential? Chapter VII.-Paraphrasing. 75. Paraphrasing is the process of expressing an author's meaning in a different form. A sentence was defined to be a "complete thought expressed in words;" a sentence paraphrased is the same thought expressed in different words.* * ** It would probably be too great a tax upon the pupil at the present stage to ask him to write entirely original sentences, in which both the thought and the language would be his own. Preparatory to this, however, which he will be required to do in Part II., these exercises in paraphrasing should be gone through, in which the thoughts are given him, and he is required only to express them in other language. 76. This process requires in the first place, that the author's meaning should be fully and correctly understood. It should then be expressed in the most perspicuous, energetic, and graceful language the pupil can find. Example. "I envy not in any moods The captive void of noble rage, The linnet born within the cage, That never knew the summer woods."-Tennyson. The meaning of this stanza may be thus expressed : "I can only despise the indifference of those who, never having enjoyed the sweets of freedom, cannot sorrow for its loss." The succeeding stanza in the poem,— "I envy not the beast that takes His licence in the field of Time, * This must be distinguished both from Substitution (? 81), in which single expressions are varied, and from Transposition (32), in which the order of the words merely is changed. E |