we 
On Figurative Language. 97 
ideas, because he has the choice of analogies 
to an indefinite degree; and he is aware that 
the person or persons whom he addresses, are 
in the daily habit of deciphering the meaning 
of words by such analogies, and that he is in 
much greater danger of proving deficient in 
invention, than his auditors in comprehension. 
This habit of developmg the meaning of 
figurative speech, we do not possess in any 
great perfection, except in our vernacular 
tongue ; or, at least, it is perfect, or otherwise, 
in proportion to our acquaintance with any 
particular language. And hence the fact is 
easily accounted for, that, in the early progress 
of learning any language, we are frequently 
unable, by the mere help of a dictionary, 
satisfactorily to develope the meaning of an 
author. In every language, for various rea- 
sons, the mode of metaphorizing, or using 
figurative language, is, in a greater or less 
degree, characteristic and peculiar. And 
hence likewise arises the difficulty of using a 
foreign dialect with propriety, either in dis- 
course or writing, because We are in continual 
danger of departing from the idiomatical mode 
of metaphorizing customary in that dialect. 
The evidence of the above theory, if it may 
aspire to be so denominated, appears more or 
N 
