Institutio Oratoria
Quintilian
Quintilian. Institutio Oratoria, Volume 1-4. Butler, Harold Edgeworth, translator. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, William Heinemann Ltd., 1920-1922.
While a temperate and timely use of metaphor is
or they may even be coarse. For it does not follow that because Cicero was perfectly justified in talking of
- There is a rocky wart upon the mountain's
- brow.
the sink of the state,[*]( In Cat. I. v. 12. ) when he desired to indicate the foulness of certain men, we can approve the following passage from an ancient orator:
You have lanced the boils of the state.
Indeed Cicero [*](De Or. iii. xli. 164. ) himself has demonstrated in the most admirable manner how important it is to avoid grossness in metaphor, such as is revealed by the following examples, which he quotes:—
The state was gelded by the death of Africanus,or
Glaucia, the excrement of the senate-house.
He also points out that a metaphor must not be too great for its subject or, as is more frequently the case, too little, and that it must not be inappropriate. Anyone who realises that these are faults, will be able to detect instances of them only too frequently. But excess in the use of metaphor is also a fault, more especially if they are of the same species.
Metaphors may also be harsh, that is, far-fetched, as in phrases like
the snows of the heador
From Furius, an old epic poet of the second century (not Furius Bibaculus), cp. Hor. S. ii. v. 11.
- Jove with white snow the wintry Alps bespewed.
For my own part I should not regard a phrase like
the shepherd of the peopleas admissible in pleading, although it has the authority of Homer, nor would I venture to say that winged creatures
swim through the air,despite the fact that this metaphor has been most effectively employed by Virgil to describe the flight of bees and of Daedalus.1 For metaphor should always either occupy a place already vacant, or if it fills the room of something else, should be more impressive than that which it displaces.
What I have said above applies perhaps with even greater force to synecdocheè. For while metaphor is designed to move the feelings, give special distinction to things and place them vividly before the eye, synecdocheè has the power to give variety to our language by making us realise many things from one, the whole from a part, the genus from a species, things which follow from things which have preceded; or, on the other hand, the whole procedure may be reversed. It may, however, be more freely employed by poets than by orators.
For while in prose it is perfectly correct to use macro, the point, for the whole sword, and tectum, roof, for a whole house, we may not employ puppis, stern, to describe a ship, nor abies, fir, to describe planks; and again, though ferrunm, the steel, may be used to indicate a sword, quadrupes cannot be used in the
The Roman won the day,when he means that the Romans were victorious; on the other hand, Cicero in a letter to Brutus [*](This letter is lost.) says,
We have imposed on the people and are regarded as orators,when he is speaking of himself alone.
This form of trope is not only a rhetorical ornament, but is frequently employed in everyday speech. Some also apply the term synecdoche when something is assumed which has not actually been expressed, since one word is then discovered from other words, as in the sentence,
when such omission creates a blemish, it is called an ellipse.Aen. xi. 142. A false explanation of the historic infinitive as involving the omission of some such word as coeperunt.
- The Arcadians to the gates began to rush;
For my own part, I prefer to regard this as a figure, and shall therefore discuss it under that head. Again, one thing may be suggested by another, as in the line,
from which we infer the approach of night. I am not sure whether this is permissible to an orator except in arguments, when it serves as an indication of some fact. However, this has nothing to do with the question of style.Ed. ii. 61
- Behold, the steers
- Bring back the plough suspended from the yoke,
It is but a short step from synecdocheè to metonymy, which consists in the substitution of one name for another, and, as Cicero [*](Orat. xxvii. 93. ) tells us, is called hypallage by the rhetoricians. These devices are employed to indicate an invention by substituting the name of
and Horace:
- Ceres by water spoiled,
If, however, the process is reversed, the effect is harsh.A. P. 63.
- Neptune admitted to the land
- Protects the fleets from blasts of Aquilo.
But it is important to enquire to what extent tropes of this kind should be employed by the orator. For though we often hear
Vulcanused for fire and to say vario Marte pugnatum est for
they fought with varying successis elegant and idiomatic, while Venus is a more decent expression than coitus, it would be too bold for the severe style demanded in the courts to speak of Liber and Ceres when we mean bread and wine. Again, while usage permits us to substitute that which contains for that which is contained, as in phrases such as
civilised cities,or
a cup was drunk to the lees,or
a happy age,
the converse procedure would rarely be ventured on by any save a poet: take, for example, the phrase:
It is, however, perhaps more permissible to describe what is possessed by reference to its possessor, as, for example, to say of a man whose estate is being squandered,Aen. ii. 311.
- Ucalegon burns next.
the man is being eaten up.Of this form there are innumerable species.
For example, we say
sixty thousand men were slain by Hannibal at Cannae,and speak of
Virgilwhen we mean
Virgil's poems; again, we say that supplies have
come,when they have been
brought,that a
sacrilege,and not a
sacrilegious manhas been detected, and that a man possesses a knowledge of
arms,not of
the art of arms.