Figuring glory and honour to be a garland of

flowers.

Hotspur.

-Would to heaven,

Thy name in arms were now as great as mine!

Pr. Henry. I'll make it greater, ere I part from thee, And all the budding honours on thy crest

I'll crop, to make a garland for my head.

First Part Henry IV. Act v. Sc. 4.

Figuring a man who hath acquired great reputation and honour to be a tree full of fruit :

-Oh, boys, this story

The world may read in me: my body's mark'd
With Roman swords; and my report was once
First with the best of note. Cymbeline lov'd me;
And when a soldier was the theme, my name
Was not far off: then was I as a tree

Whose bows did bend with fruit. But in one night,
A storm or robbery, call it what you will,

Shook down my mellow hangings, nay my leaves,
And left me bare to weather.

Cymbeline, Act III. Sc. 3.

Blest be thy soul, thou king of shells, said Swaran of the dark-brown shield. In peace thou art the gale of spring; in war, the mountain-storm. Take now my hand in friendship, thou noble king of Morven. Fingal.

Thou dwellest in the soul of Malvína, son of mighty Ossian. My sighs arise with the beam of the east; my tears descend with the drops of night. I was a lovely tree in thy presence, Oscar, with all my branches round me; but thy death came like a blast from the desart, and laid

my green head low; the spring returned with its showers, but no leaf of mine arose.

Fingal.

I am aware that the term metaphor has been used in a more extensive sense than I give it; but I thought it of consequence, in a disquisition of some intricacy, to confine the term to its proper sense, and to separate from it things that are distinguished by different names. An allegory differs from a metaphor; and what I would choose to call a figure of speech, differs from both. I proceed to explain these differences. A metaphor is defined above to be an act of the imagination, figuring one thing to be another. An allegory requires no such operation, nor is one thing figured to be another: it consists in choosing a subject having properties or circumstances resembling those of the principal subject; and the former is described in such a manner as to represent the latter; the subject thus represented is kept out of view; we are left to discover it by reflection; and we are pleased with the discovery, because it is our own work. Quintilian* gives the following instance of an allegory,

Ọ navis, referent in mare te novi

Fluctus. O quid agis? fortiter occupa portum.
Horat. l. 1. ode 14.

and explains it elegantly in the following words : "Totusque ille Horatii locus, quo navim pro re

publica, fluctuum tempestates pro bellis civilibus

portum pro pace, atque concordia, dicit."

*L. 8. Cap. 6. Sect. 2.

A finer or more correct allegory is not to be found than the following, in which a vineyard is made to represent God's own people the Jews.

Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. Thou didst cause it to take deep root, and it filled the land. The hills were covered with its shadow, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars. Why hast thou then broken down her hedges, so that all which pass do pluck her? The boar out of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beast doth devour it. Return, we beseech thee, O God of hosts: look down from heaven, and behold and visit this vine, and the vineyard thy right hand hath planted, and the branch thou madest strong for thyself... Psalm 80.

In a word, an allegory is in every respect similar to an hieroglyphical painting, excepting only that words are used instead of colours. Their effects are precisely the same: a hieroglyphic raises two images in the mind; one seen, which represents one not seen an allegory does the same; the representative subject is described; and resemblance leads us to apply the description to the subject represented. In a figure of speech, there is no fiction of the imagination employed, as in a metaphor, nor a representative subject introduced, as in an allegory. This figure, as its name implies, regards the expression only, not the thought; and it may be defined, the using a word in a sense different from what is proper to it. Thus youth, or the beginning of life, is expressed figuratively by morning of life morning is the beginning of the day; and in that view it is employed to signify the beginning

of any other series, life especially, the progress of which is reckoned by days.

Figures of speech are reserved for a separate section; but metaphor and allegory are so much connected, that they must be handled together: the rules particularly for distinguishing the good from the bad, are common to both. We shall therefore proceed to these rules, after adding some examples to illustrate the nature of an allegory. Horace, speaking of his love to Pyrrha, which was now extinguished, expresseth himself thus:

Queen. Great Lords, wise men ne'er sit and wail their

loss,

But cheerly seek how to redress their harms.

What though the mast be now thrown overboard;
The cable broke, the holding anchor lost,
And half our sailors swallow'd in the flood;
Yet lives our pilot still. Is't meet, that he
Should leave the helm, and, like a fearful lad,
With tearful
eyes, add water to the sea,

And give more strength to that which hath too much;
While in his moan the ship splits on the rock,
Which industry and courage might have sav'd?
Ah, what a shame! ah, what a fault were this!

Third Part Henry VI. Act v. Sc. 4.

Oroonoko. Ha! thou hast rous'd

The lion in his den: he stalks abroad,
And the wide forest trembles at his roar.
I find the danger now.

Oroonoko, Act III. Sc. 2.

My well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. He fenced it, gathered out the stones thereof, planted it with the choicest vines, built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a wine-press therein; he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard. What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done? Wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes? And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down. And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged, but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant.

Isaiah, v. 1.

The rules that govern metaphors, and allegories, are of two kinds: the construction of these figures comes under the first kind; the propriety or impropriety of introduction comes under the other. I begin with rules of the first kind; some of which