Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it. Thou didst cause it to take deep root, and it filled the land. The hills were covered with its shadow, and the boughs thereof were like the goodly cedars. Why hast thou then broken down her hedges, so that all which pass do pluck her? The boar out of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beast doth devour it. Return, we beseech thee, O God of hosts: look down from heaven, and behold and visit this vine, and the vineyard thy right hand hath planted, and the branch thou madest strong for thyself.
Psalm 80.
In a word, an allegory is in every respect similar to an hieroglyphical painting, excepting only, that words are used instead of colours. Their effects are precisely the same. A hieroglyphic raises two images in the mind; one seen, which represents one not seen. An allegory does the same. The representative subject is described; and it is by resemblance that we are enabled to apply the description to the subject represented.
In a figure of speech, neither is there any fiction of the imagination employ’d, nor a representative subject introduced. A figure of speech, as imply’d from its name, regards the expression only, not the thought; and it may be defined, the employing a word in a sense different from what is proper to it. Thus youth or the beginning of life, is expressed figuratively by morning of life. Morning is the beginning of the day; and it is transferred sweetly and easily to signify the beginning of any other series, life especially, the progress of which is reckoned by days.
Figures of speech are reserved for a separate section; but a metaphor and allegory are so much connected, that it is necessary to handle them together: the rules for distinguishing the good from the bad, are common to both. We shall therefore proceed to these rules, after adding some examples to illustrate the nature of an allegory. Horace speaking of his love to Pyrrha, which was now extinguished, expresses himself thus.
—————— Me tabulâ sacer
Votivâ paries indicat uvida
Suspendisse potenti
Vestimenta maris Deo.
Carm. l. 1. ode 5.
Again,
Phœbus volentem prælia me loqui,
Victas et urbes, increpuit lyrâ:
Ne parva Tyrrhenum per æquor
Vela darem.
Carm. l. 4. ode 15.
Queen. Great Lords, wise men ne’er sit and wail their loss,
But chearly seek how to redress their harms.
What though the mast be now blown overboard,
The cable broke, the holding anchor lost,
And half our sailors swallow’d in the flood?
Yet lives our pilot still. Is’t meet, that he
Should leave the helm, and, like a fearful lad,
With tearful eyes add water to the sea;
And give more strength to that which hath too much?
While in his moan the ship splits on the rock,
Which industry and courage might have sav’d?
Ah, what a shame! ah, what a fault were this!
Third Part Henry VI. act 5. sc. 5.
Oroonoko. Ha! thou hast rous’d
The lion in his den, he stalks abroad
And the wide forest trembles at his roar.
I find the danger now.
Oroonoko, act 3. sc. 2.