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of mental operations were originally applied to something sensible as perception, apprehension, conception, recollection, deliberation, inspiration, imagination, sagacity (originally quickness of smell), acuteness, penetration, emotion, expression.

Many of these derived terms have acquired a greater prevalence in their transferred use than in their first appli cation in which case they cease to be thought of as figurative, and become, as it were, the literal names for the things that they now chiefly represent. Such are melancholy (black bile), edify (build), acuteness (sharpness), ardour (heat), express (to press out), crush (bend), enhance (lift), provide (see beforehand), detect (unroof), cynosure.

In these instances, the original meaning is no longer suggested to the mind. In other cases, the words are still used in the primitive as well as in a figurative sense, and hence they continue to have a certain illustrative force of similarity as point, line, solid, height, breadth, depth, smooth, rough, hard, soft, dry, bitter, sweet, hot, cold, fire, light, dark, colour, clear, dim, harmony, discord, rest, motion, balance, stability, support, fountain, stream, ocean, root, sem, fruit, mountain, forest, field, desert, life, death, star, planet, comet, meteor, cloud, thunder, lead, follow.

Examples of metaphors whose only merit is to furnish terms. Adam Smith's word Division, applied to labour, was wholly unsuited to his meaning: an actual case of division of labour would be for two persons to work at the same job, and relieve each other. The grammatical designations, strong and weak verbs, are false metaphors, though furnishing convenient names. 'Idols,' as applied to fallacies, has little relevance, but is really an anglicised form of Bacon's idola, which was taken from Plato's use of elowλov for a 'phantom' of the mind. Bacon's designation of his classes of fallacies as idola tribús, idola specûs, idola fori, and idola theatri, serves to furnish names, but has little appropriateness in the figures.

The following musical terms furnish examples of metaphors without much fitness in themselves, but serving to originate names; many of them have now practically dropped the figurative idea. Scale (properly a ladder), chromatic (colouring), key, key-note; staff, stave; sharp, flat; movement (for a complete portion of a long composition).

In some instances words are employed as metaphors in meanings completely at variance with their original use, thereby causing conflict and loss of power. The words 'Alloy,' 'Amalgam,' 'Fusion,' are notable examples. An Alloy, in chemistry and in the arts, means the mixing of two or more metals, generally with the view of producing a compound superior in quality and in usefulness to a simple metal. It is altogether an exception to make an alloy of a precious metal with some inferior one in order to palm off a debased article. Yet this is the only meaning attached to the word in its metaphorical use. Again, an Amalgam means solely the union of mercury with another metal. The attraction of mercury for silver and gold is so powerful as to be the principal means of separating those metals from the ores. But the metaphorical Amalgam is simply a vague name for intimate union or combination, as when two separate societies are united into one. In this fact there is no implication of any characteristic feature of the amalgam, as understood in science. Lastly, the word Fusion in physics means melting and no more. In its transference as a metaphor, it signifies mixing solely.

3. The brevity of the Metaphor renders it liable to the vice called Mixing Metaphors.

This arises when metaphors from different sources are combined in the same subject: as 'to kindle a seed'. We may sow a seed or kindle a flame; but kindling a seed is incongruous and confusing to the mind.

The following example from Addison is familiar

I bridle in my struggling muse with pain

That longs to launch into a bolder strain.

Three different figures are conjoined in one action.

'The very hinge and centre of an immense system:' 'hinge' is out of place.

All my pretty chickens and their dam' is the mixing of two metaphors.

A common incongruity is to speak of 'scenes being enacted': a play or drama is enacted, and in the course of the play the scenes are shifted.

Mackintosh's philosophic mind threw a luminous radiance over that intricate subject, the criminal code:' with 'luminous radiance,' we should have 'dark' or 'obscure' applied to the subject.

'Their reputation was not bounded by the shallow waters of the historic Tweed, or even by the then far greater width of the Channel.' Here the obstruction is presented in two different and inconsistent aspects.

Physiology and psychology thus become united, and the study of man passes from the uncertain light of mere opinion to the region of science.'

The very recognition of these by the jurisprudence of a nation is a mortal wound to the very keystone upon which the whole vast arch of morality reposes.'

Thomson has this remarkable mixture of figures—

Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew,
Flames through the nerves, and boils along the veins.
Shelley has this example in the Ode to the West Wind-

O, thou,

Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave.

The following are from Keats, illustrating further the tendency to incongruity in writers that indulge in great profusion of similitudes.

With beaded bubbles winking at the brim

with reference to a "beaker" full of wine.

Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendeth its odour with the violet,—
Solution sweet.

Here the figure of melting is interrupted by a simile changing the conception, and is resumed again in "solution sweet".

Slowly they sail, slowly as icy isle

Upon a calm sea drifting.

If an iceberg is described as an 'icy isle,' it should not be when it is conceived as 'drifting'.

Even Pope, usually correct in such points, has the following remarkable mixture

Love, hope and joy, fair pleasure's smiling train,
Hate, fear and grief, the family of pain,

These mixt with art, and to due bounds confined,
Make and maintain the balance of the mind;

The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life.

Each clause introduces a new conception, though the subject is the same throughout.

Thus :

There is no objection to different metaphors being successively applied to the same subject, provided they are kept distinct. They admire the profundity of what is mystical and obscure, mistaking the muddiness of the water for depth (1), and magnifying in their imagina

tions what is viewed through a fog' (2). (Whately.) The harmony of each figure applied to the subject, is a feature in such finished writers as Gray and Campbell. Compare, for example, the figures in the two stanzas of the Elegy' beginning

But knowledge to their eyes her ample page—

or the six lines beginning

Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne-

or the lines

Even from the tomb the voice of natures cries,
Even in our ashes live their wonted fires.

When words do not readily suggest their metaphorical basis, the incongruity is not felt. In the line of YoungHer voice is but the shadow of a sound,

the mixture is not objectionable.

So

A touch of shame upon her check.

In these instances, the metaphorical usage is so habitual as to prevent the original meaning from asserting itself. Somewhat similar is the case with the lines in Tennyson, describing death as

The shadow cloaked from head to foot,
Who keeps the keys of all the creeds.

Here term shadow is employed to designate a being conceived as unsubstantial, yet dark; and, with this application, there is nothing inharmonious in ascribing to the shadow' the personal attributes of being cloaked and keeping keys.

There are, however, many words that have ceased to be metaphors, but still so far suggest their original meaning as to give the sense of harmony when the figure is attended to. Thus, to say the impression was conveyed' is not in keeping, although quite intelligible. Upon the style it is that these perplexities depend for their illumination.'

Fetter' properly means a chain or bond for the feet. It is often used for bonds in general; but has not so lost its primary signification that we may speak, without inconsistency, of beneficial legislation that has struck the fetters from the hands of industry'.

So in this instance: The decline of the material comforts of the working classes had been incessant, and had

'Their reputation was not bounded by the shallow waters of the historic Tweed, or even by the then far greater width of the Channel.' Here the obstruction is presented in two different and inconsistent aspects.

'Physiology and psychology thus become united, and the study of man passes from the uncertain light of inere opinion to the region of science.'

The very recognition of these by the jurisprudence of a nation is a mortal wound to the very keystone upon which the whole vast arch of morality reposes.'

Thomson has this remarkable mixture of figures-

Straight the fierce storm involves his mind anew,

Flames through the nerves, and boils along the veins.
Shelley has this example in the Ode to the West Wind-

O, thou,

Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed

The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave.

The following are from Keats, illustrating further the tendency to incongruity in writers that indulge in great profusion of similitudes.

With beaded bubbles winking at the brim

with reference to a "beaker" full of wine.

Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendeth its odour with the violet,—
Solution sweet.

Here the figure of melting is interrupted by a simile changing the conception, and is resumed again in "solution sweet".

Slowly they sail, slowly as icy isle

Upon a calm sea drifting.

If an iceberg is described as an 'icy isle,' it should not be when it is conceived as 'drifting'.

Even Pope, usually correct in such points, has the following remarkable mixture

Love, hope and joy, fair pleasure's smiling train,
Hate, fear and grief, the family of pain,

These mixt with art, and to due bounds confined,
Make and maintain the balance of the mind;

The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life.

Each clause introduces a new conception, though the subject is the same throughout.

Thus :

There is no objection to different metaphors being successively applied to the same subject, provided they are kept distinct. They admire the profundity of what is mystical and obscure, mistaking the muddiness of the water for depth (1), and magnifying in their imagina