A FIGURE, which, among related objects, extends the properties of one to another. This figure is not dignified with a proper name, because it has been overlooked by writers. It merits, however, a place in this work; and must be distinguished from the others elsewhere treated, as depending on a different principle. Giddy brink, jovial wine, daring wound, are examples of this figure. Here are adjectives that cannot be made to signify any quality of the substantives to which they are joined: a brink, for example, cannot be termed giddy in a sense, either proper or figurative, that can signify any of its qualities or attributes. When we examine attentively the expression, we discover, that a brink is termed giddy from producing that effect in those who stand on it: in the same manner, a wound is said to be daring, not with respect to itself, but with respect to the boldness of the person who inflicts it: and wine is said to be jovial, as inspiring mirth and jollity. Thus the attributes of one subject are extended to another with which it is connected; and the expression of such a thought must be considered as a figure, because the attribute is not applicable to the subject in any proper sense.
How are we to account for this figure, which we see lies in the thought, and to what principle shall we refer it? Have poets a privilege to alter the nature of things, and at pleasure to bestow attributes upon a subject to which they do not belong? It is observed, † Vid. Elem. of Criticism, chap. ii. that the mind passeth easily and sweetly along a train of connected objects; and, where the objects are intimately connected, that it is disposed to carry part 1. §. 6. along the good or bad properties of one to another; especially when it is in any degree inflamed with these properties. From this principle is derived the figure under consideration. Language, invented for the communication of thought, would be imperfect, if it were not expressive even of the slightest propensities and more delicate feelings: but language cannot remain so imperfect among a people who have received any polish; because language is regulated by internal feeling, and is gradually improved to express whatever passes in the mind. Thus, for example, when a sword in the hand of a coward is termed a coward sword, the expression is significative of an internal operation; for the mind, in passing from the agent
Figure. to its instrument, is disposed to extend to the latter the properties of the former. Governed by the same principle, we say listening fear, by extending the attribute listening of the man who listens, to the passion with which he is moved. In the expression, bold deed, or audax facinus, we extend to the effect what properly belongs to the cause. But not to waste time by making a commentary upon every expression of this kind, the best way to give a complete view of the subject, is to exhibit a table of the different relations that may give occasion to this figure. And in viewing the table, it will be observed, that the figure can never have any grace but where the relations are of the most intimate kind.
1. An attribute of the cause expressed as an attribute of the effect.
Audax facinus.
Of yonder fleet a bold discovery make.
An impious mortal gave the daring wound.
To my adventurous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar.
Paradise lost.
2. An attribute of the effect expressed as an attribute of the cause.
Quos periisse ambos misero censebam in mari. Plautus.
No wonder, fallen such a pernicious height.
Paradise lost.
3. An effect expressed as an attribute of the cause.
Jovial wine, Giddy brink, Drowsy night, Musing midnight,
Panting height, Astonish'd thought, Mourneful gloom.
Casting a dim religious light. MILTON, Comus.
And the merry bells ring round,
And the second rebecks found. MILTON, Allegro.
4. An attribute of a subject bestowed upon one of its parts or members.
Longing arms.
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear.
Romeo and Juliet, all 3. sc. 7.
Oh, lay by
Those most ungente looks and angry weapons;
Unless you mean my griefs and killing fears
Should stretch me out at your relentless feet
Fair Penitent, all 3.
And ready now
To stoop with wearied wing, and willing feet,
On the bare outside of this world. Paradise lost, b. 3.
5. A quality of the agent given to the instrument with which it operates.
Why peep your coward swords half out their sheaths?
6. An attribute of the agent given to the subject upon which it operates.
High-climbing hill. Milton.
7. A quality of one subject given to another.
Ieci, beatis nunc Arabum invides
Gazis. Horat. Carm. l. 1. ode 29.
When sapless age, and weak unable limbs,
Should bring thy father to his drooping chair.
Shakespeare.
By art, the pilot through the boiling deep,
And howling tempest, steers the fearless ship.
Ilad xxiii. 385.
Then, nothing loath, th' enamour'd fair he led,
And sunk transported on the conscious bed.
Odyssey viii. 337.
A stupid moment motionless like flood.
Summer, l. 1336.
8. A circumstance connected with a subject, expressed as a quality of the subject.
Breezy summit.
Tis ours the chance of fighting fields to try.
Iladi. 301.
Oh! had I dy'd before that well-fought wall.
Odyssey v. 395.
From this table it appears, that the adorning a cause with an attribute of the effect, is not so agreeable as the opposite expression. The progress from cause to effect is natural and easy: the opposite progress resembles retrograde motion*; and therefore panting height, astonish'd thought, are strained and uncouth expressions, which a writer of taste will avoid.
It is not less strained, to apply to a subject in its present state, an epithet that may belong to it in some future state:
Submersive obdure puppes. Æscid. i. 73.
And mighty rains fall. Ilad v. 411.
Impious sons their margled fathers wound.
Another rule regards this figure, That the property of one subject ought not to be bestow'd upon another with which that property is incongruous:
K. Rich. ————How dare thy joints forget
To pay their awful duty to our pretence?
Richard II. all 3. sc. 6.
The connection between an awful superior and his submissive dependent is so intimate, that an attribute may readily be transferred from the one to the other: but awfulness cannot be so transferred, because it is inconsistent with submission.