more reflective poems, like Tennyson's May Queen, and Northern Farmer. It must be borne in mind, however, that when this style is used there is special need that the ideas to be expressed be picturesque in themselves, or else concentrations in concrete form illustrating much poetic truth that is generic and universal in its applicability. For poems fulfilling perfectly the first condition, notice Kingsley's Three Fishers, and O Mary Go and Call the Cattle Home, quoted in Chapter Twenty-seventh of this work. For a poem fulfilling the second, Burns' Address to the Louse on a Lady's Bonnet, is as good as any. He ends that, as will be remembered, passing, however, in order to do it, from pure into alloyed representation, in this way:

O wad some power the giftie gi’e us

To see oursel's as ithers see us!

It wad frae monie a blunder free us

And foolish notion :

What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
And e'en devotion !

When the conditions just mentioned are fulfilled, the conception itself is representative, and often all that is needed, for the highest poetry is a literal and therefore a direct statement of that which is perceived in consciousBut this fact, in connection with further examples of direct representation, will be considered hereafter.

ness.

CHAPTER XXI.

PURE INDIRECT OR ILLUSTRATIVE REPRESENTATION.

Illustrative in Connection with Direct Representation enables a writer to cxpress almost any Phase of Thought representatively or poetically— Examples-Representation, if Direct, must communicate mainly what can be seen or heard-Inward Mental Processes can be pictured outwardly and materially only by Indirect Representation-Examples from Longfellow, Arnold, Whittier, Smith--Direct Representation developed from Instinctive Modes of Expression, exemplified in Ejaculatory Sounds and Words formed from Association; Indirect, devcloped from Reflective Modes, exemplified in Imitative Sounds and Words formed from Comparison-As in Primitive Language, with Meanings determined by Sounds, the Intorations representing Emotive Tendency result from combining Instinctive and Reflective Tendencies, so in Developed Language, with Meanings determined by Sense, the Emotive Tendency leads to a form of Illustration resulting from combining Instinctive and Reflective Tendencies; this might be termed Composite Representation-But, as in Rhetoric and Practice Indirect and Composite Representation follow the same Laws, both will be treated here as Illustrative Representation-Similes, ancient and modern, from Homer, Morris, Milton, Shakespear, Moore, Kingsley-Metaphors, ancient and modern-Used in Cases of Excitation-Examples.

LE

ET us pass on now to the illustrative forms of pure representation. The plain language used in direct representation is a development, as has been said, of the instinctive modes of expression, primarily exemplified in ejaculatory sounds; and figurative language, now to be considered, springs from the reflective modes primarily exemplified in imitative sounds. Behind the latter, therefore, there is always an intellectual purpose, a plan, a desire to

impress, if not to convince. This motive would make a prose writer didactic and argumentative. The poet it drives to illustrations, each of which in genuine poetry must be representative or picturesque, although his main thought-differing in this particular from that which must be behind direct representation-need not be so.

A moment's reflection will show us that this fact with. reference to figurative or illustrative representation, renders it possible for a writer to express almost any thought or feeling whatever in a representative and poetic way. A noise, for instance, whether slight or great, is not in itself poetic; if great, one would suppose that it would be the opposite, yet see how it may become poetic on account of the way in which it is represented:

And now and then an echo started up,

And, shuddering, fled from room to room, and died
Of fright in far apartments.

But soon obscured with smoke, all heaven appear'd,
From those deep-throated engines belched, whose roar
Embowel'd with outrageous noise the air,

And all her entrails tore, disgorging foul

Their devilish glut, chained thunderbolts, and hail

Of iron globes, which on the victor host

Level'd with such impetuous fury smote,

That whom they hit none on their feet might stand.

-Paradise Lost, 6: Milton.

That human beings often misunderstand each other is a commonplace fact of ordinary observation. But see what representation may do with the expression of the fact:

We are spirits clad in veils ;
Man by man was never seen;
All our deep communing fails
To remove the shadowy screen.

Heart to heart was never known;
Mind with mind did never meet;
We are columns left alone

Of a temple once complete.

Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart, though seeming near,

In our light we scattered lie;

All is thus but starlight here.

-Thought: Cranch.

To say that the murder of a good man will cause many to mourn, does not involve the utterance of a profound or beautiful thought, but the thought may be represented so as to seem both, as in this:

Besides this, Duncan

Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been

So clear in his great office, that his virtues

Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking off ;

And pity, like a naked new-born babe,

Striding the blast, or Heaven's cherubim, horsed
Upon the sightless couriers of the air,

Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur

To prick the sides of my intent; but only
Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
And falls on the other.-

-Macbeth, i., 7: Shakespear.

So one might go through the whole catalogue of possible thoughts and feelings, and it is a question whether a man, if enough of an artist, could not express every one of them in such words, or arrange it in such connections. or balance it by such antitheses, or trail after it such suggestions, or put it into the mouths of such characters, placed in such positions, induced by such communications, stirred by such surroundings, as to make it, although in itself most trivial, common, disagreeable, and

mean, a part of a representation which, considered as a whole, would produce an æsthetic effect.

It must be borne in mind, however, that this statement is true only because it is possible for the poet to use a kind of representation in addition to that which is direct. The latter, as we have found, must always give expression to thoughts or feelings which can be legitimately inferred from simple, straightforward accounts of certain real or imaginary events. It is all that is needed, therefore, when communicating conclusions derived from what has been seen or heard; but not so always, when communicating that which, aside from any immediate outward influence, has been inwardly thought or felt. In the latter case, the mind, if it would represent rather than present what it has to say, must resort to figures. In using these as has been shown, it simply carries out a tendency exemplified in all language, from the time of the first imitative sounds to that of words like express, impress, and understand. In accordance with this tendency, unseen mental relations or processes are represented by referring to others resembling them, which are perceptible in the visible or material world. Instead of saying, "His integrity is impaired by severe temptation," one may say, "His uprightness bends before some pressing blast." In other words, instead of using conventional language, which simply presents an idea, one may assume the attitude of the first framers of language, and represent his idea, making it, in a sense, tangible, visible, graphic. An endeavor to do this, as applied to thoughts and feelings that cannot be directly represented, is the motive underlying the primitive use of figurative language, or indirect representation, which might be termed also metaphorical, in the sense of being constructed according to the methods of the metaphor,