SIMILE

In Rhetoric, appears to differ from Metaphor (which see) only in form; the resemblance being stated in the first case, implied in the second. This is the sense in which the term Comparison is used and defined by Aristotle, in Jiis jirt qf Rhetoric. Frequently the same idea furnishes at the same time both comparison and metaphor; as in the following line, "They melted from the field as snow." The word "melted" is -used by transferring the property of the snow to a multitude of individuals: so far, therefore, the phrase is a metaphor; but the additional words, "as snow," transform it into a direct comparison. Perhaps, however, it might be more correctly said, in this instance, that the predicate " melted" is transferred by the figure termed Hypallage from the snow to the mvltitude, both words being used as subjects in the same sentence. The comparison, being as it were a metaphor resolved and rendered more flowing and le concise, is more appropriate to poetry than to prose composition. In fact, the only figures of this description which are generally admi ible in prose writing are illustrations; i. e. arguments drawn from analogy in the form of comparisons. {See Illustration.) It will generally be found that in every language the earliest writers, especially the poets, are the most addicted to the use of comparisons and metaphors of a highly figurative and hold character, as is especially observable with respect to the sacred poets, and to Homer; ^vhile as language advances in cultivation the metaphor comes more and more into ordinary use, and forms, as it were, the basis of composition, while at the same time it gradually loses the energetic and poetical cast which at first distinguished it. COMPARISON, [s. 276]