"The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;

And, in imagination, bodies forth

The forms of things unknown; the poet's pen

Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name."

SHAKSPEARE

"There's not a wind but whispers of thy name, And not a flower that sleeps beneath the moon But in its hues or fragrance tells a tale

Of thee."

PROCTOR.

"On our quick'st decrees

The inaudible and noiseless foot of time

Steals ere we can effect them."

SHAKSPEARE.

In many of the most beautiful passages of the poets both nouns and verbs are used by the figure:

"High towers old Ætna, with his feet deep clad

In the green sandals of the freshful spring;

His sides arrayed in winter, and his front
Shooting aloft the everlasting flame."

SHIEL.

Adjectives, also, and participles are often used by

the figure, as in some of the passages already

quoted, and the following:

"Her sunny locks

Hung on her temple like a golden fleece."

SHAKSPEARE

"I've seen ere now,

On some wild ruin, moss'd and gray,

A flower as fair, as sweet as thou,

Blessing with bloom its latest day!
Thy friendship, like the faithful flower-
Surviving much, defying all—

Has caused on sorrow's saddest hour

Some streaks of happier hue to fall."

BARTON.

"Say, gentle night! whose modest maiden beams
Give us a new creation, and present

The world's great picture softened to the sight;
Nay, kinder far, far more indulgent still,
Say thou whose mild dominion's silver key
Unlocks our hemisphere, and sets to view

Worlds beyond number; worlds concealed by day
Behind the proud and envious star of noon?"

YOUNG.

"What softened remembrances come o'er the heart
In gazing on those we've been lost to so long!
The sorrows, the joys, of which once they were part,
Still round them, like visions of yesterday, throng."

MOORE.

A large share of the metaphors in which adjectives are used are elliptical; as the golden fleece, the faithful flower, the proud and envious star; which are equivalent to the fleece which is golden, the flower which is faithful, the star which is proud and envious.

as:

Adverbs, also, are sometimes used by the figure,

"There was something

In my native air that buoy'd my spirits up;
Like a ship on the ocean tossed by storms,

But proudly still bestriding the high waves,
And holding on its course."

BYRON.

Prepositions, likewise, are sometimes employed by the figure, especially in propositions that relate to the mind. Thus objects are said to come into the thoughts, thoughts to rise in the mind, and desires and acts to go from the heart:

"What softened remembrances come o'er the heart!"

"Something heavy on my spirit

Too dull for wakefulness, too quick for slumber

Sits on me, as a cloud along the sky,

Which will not let the sunbeams through, nor yet
Descend in rain and end, but spreads itself
'Twixt earth and heaven, an everlasting mist."

BYRON.

In these, and other similar passages, there is a virtual ascription of dimensions to the mind, its faculties, and its thoughts, and it is in that that the figure lies.

In some of the most elegant forms of the figure whole actions-expressed by verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, and prepositions are metaphorized. Thus Shakspeare says of man:

"To-day he puts forth

The tender leaves of hope: to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him :
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,

And nips his root-and then he falls."

What is a metaphor? How does it differ from a simile? How many classes are there? What are they? How is it known what the subjects are to which elliptical metaphors are applied? What is the first characteristic of the figure? What is the second? What is the third? What are the two parts of a metaphorical proposition? Give an example. What is the fourth characteristic ? What is the sixth? What parts of speech are

What is the fifth?

used by the figure? Which are used most frequently? Give an example in which a noun is used by the figure. Give one in which a verb is used. Repeat one in which an adjective is employed. Give an example of the use of an adverb by the figure. Give an instance of a preposition that is employed metaphorically.

Where does the cæsura fall in the lines from Byron "Above me are the Alps"! Which of the lines begins with a trochee? Where does the pause fall in the lines "High towers old Ætna

with his feet deep clad"? With what feet do the several lines begin? What is there in the last that gives it a peculiarly fine modulation? Where does the pause fall in the lines from Young "Say, gentle night, whose modest maiden beams "?

LESSONS.

What word is used metaphorically in the following lines?

"All flowers will droop in absence of the sun

That wak'd their sweets."

DRYDEN.

In the following lines, omitting the sixth, two verbs are used by the figure. Which are they? And how many comparisons are there in it?

"As slow our ship her foamy track

Against the wind was cleaving,

Her trembling pennant still look'd back

To that dear isle 't was leaving.
So loth we part from all we love,
From all the links that bind us;

So turn our hearts, where'er we rove,
To those we've left behind us."

MOORE

In the following lines there is a comparison; and one adjective, one verb, and three nouns, are used metaphorically. Point them

out.

"Sweet are the uses of adversity;

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,

Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.

And this our life, exempt from public haunt,

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in everything."

SHAKSPEARE