In order to set this Matter in a clear Light to every Reader, I shall in the first Place observe, that a Metaphor is a Simile in one Word, which serves to convey the Thoughts of the Mind under Resemblances and Images which affect the Senses. There is not any thing in the World, which may not be compared to several Things, if considered in several distinct Lights; or, in other Words, the same thing may be expressed by different Metaphors. But the Mischief is, that an unskilful Author shall run these Metaphors so absurdly into one another, that there shall be no Simile, no agreeable Picture, no apt Resemblance, but Confusion, Obscurity, and Noise. Thus I have known a Hero compared to a Thunderbolt, a Lion, and the Sea; all and each of them proper Metaphors for impetuosity, Courage or Force. But by bad Management it hath so happened, that the Thunder-bolt hath overflowed its Banks; the Lion hath been darted through the Skies, and the Billows have rolled out of the
Libyan
Desart.
The Absurdity in this Instance is obvious. And yet every time that clashing Metaphors are put together, this Fault is committed more or less. It hath already been said, that Metaphors are Images of things which affect the Senses. An Image therefore, taken from what acts upon the Sight, cannot, without Violence, be applied to the Hearing; and so of the rest. It is no less an impropriety to make any Being in Nature or Art to do things in its Metaphorical State, which it could not do in its Original. I shall illustrate what I have said by an Instance which I have read more than once in Controversial Writers.
The heavy Lashes
, saith a celebrated Author,
that have dropped from your Pen
, &c. I suppose this Gentleman having frequently heard of
Gall dropping from a Pen
, and