The Philosophy of Style | Page 9

realized, and its full effect produced.
§ 38. Of the position of the Simile, it needs only to remark, that what has been said respecting the order of the adjective and substantive, predicate and subject, principal and subordinate propositions, &c., is applicable here. As whatever qualifies should precede whatever is qualified, force will generally be gained by placing the simile before the object to which it is applied. That this arrangement is the best, may be seen in the following passage from the ‘Lady of the Lake’;
"As wreath of snow, on mountain breast, Slides from the rock that gave it rest, Poor Ellen glided from her stay, And at the monarch’s feet she lay."
Inverting these couplets will be found to diminish the effect considerably. There are cases, however, even where the simile is a simple one, in which it may with advantage be placed last, as in these lines from Alexander Smith’s ‘Life Drama’:
"I see the future stretch All dark and barren as a rainy sea."
The reason for this seems to be, that so abstract an idea as that attaching to the word "future," does not present itself to the mind in any definite form, and hence the subsequent arrival at the simile entails no reconstruction of the thought.
§ 39. Such, however, are not the only cases in which this order is the most forcible. As the advantage of putting the simile before the object depends on its being carried forward in the mind to assist in forming an image of the object, it must happen that if, from length or complexity, it cannot be so carried forward, the advantage is not gained. The annexed sonnet, by Coleridge, is defective from this cause:
"As when a child, on some long winter’s night, Affrighted, clinging to its grandam’s knees, With eager wond’ring and perturb’d delight Listens strange tales of fearful dark decrees, Mutter’d to wretch by necromantic spell; Or of those hags who at the witching time Of murky midnight, ride the air sublime, And mingle foul embrace with fiends of hell; Cold horror drinks its blood! Anon the tear More gentle starts, to hear the beldame tell Of pretty babes, that lov’d each other dear, Murder’d by cruel uncle’s mandate fell: Ev’n such the shiv’ring joys thy tones impart, Ev’n so, thou, Siddons, meltest my sad heart."
§ 40. Here, from the lapse of time and accumulation of circumstances, the first part of the comparison is forgotten before its application is reached, and requires re-reading. Had the main idea been first mentioned, less effort would have been required to retain it, and to modify the conception of it into harmony with the comparison, than to remember the comparison, and refer back to its successive features for help in forming the final image.
§ 41. The superiority of the Metaphor to the Simile is ascribed by Dr. Whately to the fact that "all men are more gratified at catching the resemblance for themselves, than in having it pointed out to them." But after what has been said, the great economy it achieves will seem the more probable cause. Lear’s exclamation--
"Ingratitude! thou marble-hearted fiend,"
would lose part of its effect were it changed into--
"Ingratitude! thou fiend with heart like marble;"
and the loss would result partly from the position of the simile and partly from the extra number of words required. When the comparison is an involved one, the greater force of the metaphor, consequent on its greater brevity, becomes much more conspicuous. If, drawing an analogy between mental and physical phenomena, we say, "As, in passing through the crystal, beams of white light are decomposed into the colours of the rainbow; so, in traversing the soul of the poet, the colourless rays of truth are transformed into brightly tinted poetry"; it is clear that in receiving the double set of words expressing the two halves of the comparison, and in carrying the one half to the other, considerable attention is absorbed. Most of this is saved, however, by putting the comparison in a metaphorical form, thus: "The white light of truth, in traversing the many sided transparent soul of. the poet, is refracted into iris-hued poetry."
§ 42. How much is conveyed in a few words by the help of the Metaphor, and how vivid the effect consequently produced, may be abundantly exemplified. From ‘A Life Drama’ may be quoted the phrase--
"I spear’d him with a jest,"
as a fine instance among the many which that poem contains. A passage in the ‘Prometheus Unbound,’ of Shelley, displays the power of the metaphor to great advantage:
"Methought among the lawns together We wandered, underneath the young gray dawn, And multitudes of dense white fleecy clouds Were wandering, in thick flocks along the mountains Shepherded by the slow unwilling wind."
This last expression is remarkable for the distinctness with which it realizes the