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And when a foldier was the theme, my name
Was not far off: then was I as a tree,

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

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

Cymbeline, act 3. sc. 3.

Bleft be thy foul, thou king of shells, faid Swaran of the dark-brown fhield. In peace thou art the gale of fpring in war the mountain-storm. Take now my in friendship, thou noble king of Morven.

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hand

Fingal.

Thou dwelleft in the foul of Malvina, fon of mighty Offian. My fighs arife with the beam of the east: my tears defcend with the drops of night. I was a lovely tree in thy prefence, Ofcar, with all my branches round me: but thy death came like a blast from the defert, and laid my green head low; the spring returned with its showers, but no leaf of mine arofe. Fingal

I am aware that the term metaphor has been ufed in a more extensive sense than I give it; but I thought it of confequence, in a difquifition of fome intricacy, to feparate things that differ from each other, and to confine words within their most proper fenfe. An allegory differs from a metaphor; and what I would chufe to call a figure of Speech, differs from both. I proceed to explain thefe differences. A metaphor is defined above to be an operation of the imagination, figuring one thing to be another. An allegory requires no operation of the imagination, nor is one thing figured

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figured to be another: it confifts in chusing a fuoject having properties or circumstances refembling thofe of the principal fubject; and the former is defcribed in fuch a manner as to represent the latter: the fubject thus reprefented is kept out of view; we are left to difcover it by reflection; and we are pleased with the discovery, because it is our own work. Quintilian * gives the following instance of an allegory:

O navis, referent in mare te novi

Fluctus. O quid agis? fortiter occupa portum.

Horat. lib. 1. ode 14.

and explains it elegantly in the following words: "Totufque ille Horatii locus, quo navim pro re"publica, fluctuum tempeftates pro bellis civili"bus, portum pro pace atque concordia, dicit."

There cannot be a finer or more correct allegory than the following, in which a vineyard is made to reprefent God's own people the Jews:

Thou haft brought a vine out of Egypt: thou haft caft 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 fhadow, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars. Why haft thou then broken down her hedges, fo that all which pafs do pluck her? The boar out of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beaft doth devour it. Return, we beseech thee, O God of

L. 8. cap. 6. fect. 2.

hofts:

hofts: look down from heaven, and behold, and vifit this vine, and the vineyard thy right hand hath planted, and the branch thou madest strong for thyself.

Pfalm 80.

Their

In a word, an allegory is in every respect fimilar to an hieroglyphical painting, excepting only, that words are used instead of colours. effects are precifely the fame: a hieroglyphic raifes two images in the mind; one feen, which represents one not feen: an allegory does the fame; the representative fubject is defcribed; and resemblance leads us to apply the defcription to the subject reprefented. In a figure of speech, there is no fiction of the imagination employ'd, nor a reprefentative fubject introduced. This figure, as its name implies, regards the expreflion only, not the thought; and it may be defined, the using a word in a fenfe different from what is proper to it. Thus youth, or the beginning of life, is expreffed figuratively by morning of life: morning is the beginning of the day; and in that view it is employ'd to fignify the beginning of any other feries, life cfpecially, the progrefs of which is reckoned by days.

Figures of fpeech are referved for a feparate fection; but metaphor and allegory are fo much connected, that they must be handled together: the rules particularly for diftinguifhing the good from the bad, are common to both. We fhall therefore proceed to thefe rules, after adding

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fome examples to illuftrate the nature of an allegory. Horace, fpeaking of his love to Pyrrha, which was now extinguished, expreffeth himself thus:

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Queen. Great Lords, wife men ne'er fit and wail their

lofs,

But chearly feek how to redress their harms.

What though the maft be now blown overboard,
The cable broke, the holding-anchor loft,

And half our failors fwallow'd in the flood?

Yet lives our pilot ftill. Is't meet, that he
Should leave the helm, and, like a fearful lad,

With tearful eyes add water to the fea;

And give more ftrength to that which hath too much?
While in his moan the fhip splits on the rock,
Which industry and courage might have fav'd?
Ah, what a fhame! ah, what a fault were this!

Third Part Henry VI. act 5. sc. 5.

Orooncko. Ha! thou haft rous'd The lion in his den, he stalks abroad,

And

And the wide foreft trembles at his roar.
I find the danger now.

Oroonoko, act 3. fc. 2.

My well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. He fenced it, gathered out the ftones thereof, planted it with the choiceft vine, built a tower in the midft of it, and alfo made a wine-prefs therein: he looked that it fhould bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerufalem, 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 fhall be trodden down. And I will lay it wafte: it fhall not be pruned, nor digged, but there fhall come up briers and thorns: I will alfo command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the Lord of hofts is the house of Ifrael, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant. Ifaiah, v. 1.

The rules that govern metaphors and allegories, are of two kinds: thofe of the firft kind concern the conftruction of thefe figures, and afcertain what are regular and what irregular; thofe of the other kind concern the propriety or impropriety of introduction, in what circumstances these figures may be admitted, and in what circumstances they are out of place. I begin with rules of the firft kind; fome of which coincide

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