III Figures of Speech
+87. Figures of Speech.+—A figure of speech is a change from the usual form of expression for the purpose of producing a greater effect. These changes may be effective either because they are more pleasing to us or because they are more forcible, or for both reasons.
While figurative language is a change from the usual mode of expression, we are not to think of it as being unnatural. It is, in fact, as natural as plain language, and nearly every one, from the illiterate to the most learned, makes use of it, more or less, in his ordinary conversation. This arises from, the fact that we all enjoy comparisons and substitutions. When we say that we have been pegging away all day at our work, or that the wind howls, or that the man has a heart of steel, we are making use of figures of speech. Figurative language ranges from these very simple expressions to the beautiful figures of speech found in so much of our poetry. Written prose contains many beautiful and forcible examples, but it is in poetry that we find most of them.
+88. Simile.+—A simile is an expressed comparison between objects belonging to different classes. We must remember, however, that all resemblances do not constitute similes. If we compare two trees, or two beehives, or two rivers, our comparison is not a simile. If we compare a tree to a person, a beehive to a schoolroom, or time to a river, we may form a good simile, since the things compared do not belong to the same class. The best similes are those in which the ideas compared have one strong point of resemblance, and are unlike in all other respects.
1. How far that little candle throws its beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
—Shakespeare.
2. For very young he seemed, tenderly reared; Like some young cypress, tall, and dark, and straight.
—Matthew Arnold.
3. In the primrose-tinted sky The wan little moon Hangs like a jewel dainty and rare.
—Francis C. Rankin.
+89. Metaphor.+—A metaphor differs from a simile in that the comparison is implied rather than expressed. They are essentially the same as far as the comparison is concerned, and usually the one kind may be easily changed to the other. In a simile we say that one object is like another, in a metaphor we say that one object is another.
Exercises
Select the metaphors in the following and change them to similes:—
1. In arms the Austrian phalanx stood,
A living wall, a human wood.
—James Montgomery.
2. The familiar lines Are footpaths for the thoughts of Italy.
—Longfellow.
3. Life is a leaf of paper white, Whereon each one of us may write His word or two, and then comes night.
—Lowell.
+90. Personification.+—Personification is a special form of the metaphor in which life is attributed to inanimate objects or the characteristics of persons are attributed to objects, animals, or even to abstract ideas.
Exercises
Explain why the following quotations are examples of personifications:—
1. The day is done; and slowly from the scene The stooping sun upgathers his spent shafts And puts them back into his golden quiver.
—Longfellow.
2. Time is a cunning workman and no man can detect his joints.
—Charles Pierce Burton.
3. The sun is couched, the seafowl gone to rest, And the wild storm hath somewhere found a nest.
—Wordsworth.
4. See the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother.
—Shelley.
+91. Apostrophe.+—Apostrophe is like personification, but has an additional characteristic. When we directly address inanimate objects or the absent as if they were present, we call the figure of speech thus formed apostrophe.
The following are examples of apostrophe:—
1. Break, break, break, At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
—Tennyson.
2. Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight, Make me a child again just for to-night! Mother, come back from the echoless shore, Take me again to your heart as of yore.
—Elizabeth Akers Allen.
+92. Metonymy.+—Metonymy consists in substituting one object for another, the two being so closely associated that the mention of one suggests the other.
1. The pupils are reading George Eliot. 2. Each hamlet heard the call. 3. Strike for your altars and your fires. 4. Gray hairs should be respected.
+93. Synecdoche.+—Synecdoche consists in substituting a part of anything for the whole or a whole for the part.
1. A babe, two summers old.
2. Give us this day our daily bread.
3. Ring out the thousand years of woe,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
4. Fifty mast are on the ocean.
+94. Other Figures of Speech.+—Sometimes, especially in older rhetorics, the following so-called figures of speech are added to the list already given: irony, hyperbole, antithesis, climax, and interrogation. The two former pertain rather to style, in fact, are qualities of style, while the last two might properly be placed along with kinds of sentences or paragraph development. Since these so-called figures are not all mentioned elsewhere in this text, a brief explanation and example of each will be given here.
1. Irony consists in saying just the opposite of the intended meaning, but in such a way that it emphasizes that meaning.
What has the gray-haired prisoner done?
Has murder stained his hands with gore?
Not so; his crime is a fouler one—
God made the old man poor.
—Whittier.
2. Hyperbole is an exaggerated expression used to increase the effectiveness of a statement.
He was a man of boundless knowledge.
3. Antithesis consists merely of contrasted statements. This contrast may be found in a single sentence or it may be extended through an entire paragraph.
Look like the innocent flower,
But be the serpent under it.
—Shakespeare.
4. Climax consists of an ascendant arrangement of words or ideas.
I came, I saw, I conquered.
5. When a question is asked, not for the purpose of obtaining information but in order to make speech more effective, it is called the figure of interrogation. An affirmative question denies and a negative question affirms.
1. Am I my brother’s keeper? 2. Am I not free?