knows that excited
persons are given to figures of speech. The vituperation of the vulgar
abounds with them: often, indeed, consists of little else. "Beast,"
"brute," "gallows rogue," "cut-throat villain," these, and other like
metaphors and metaphorical epithets, at once call to mind a street
quarrel. Further, it may be noticed that extreme brevity is another
characteristic of passionate language. The sentences are generally
incomplete; the particles are omitted; and frequently important words
are left to be gathered from the context. Great admiration does not
vent itself in a precise proposition, as--"It is beautiful"; but in the
simple exclamation--"Beautiful!" He who, when reading a lawyer's letter,
should say, "Vile rascal!" would be thought angry; while, "He is a vile
rascal!" would imply comparative coolness. Thus we see that alike in
the order of the words, in the frequent use of figures, and in extreme
conciseness, the natural utterances of excitement conform to the
theoretical conditions of forcible expression.

Sec. 51. Hence, then, the higher forms of speech acquire a secondary
strength from association. Having, in actual life, habitually heard them
in connection with vivid mental impressions, and having been accustomed
to meet with them in the most powerful writing, they come to have in
themselves a species of force. The emotions that have from time to time
been produced by the strong thoughts wrapped up in these forms, are
partially aroused by the forms themselves. They create a certain degree
of animation; they induce a preparatory sympathy, and when the striking
ideas looked for are reached, they are the more vividly realized.

Sec. 52. The continuous use of these modes of expression that are alike
forcible in themselves and forcible from their associations, produces
the peculiarly impressive species of composition which we call poetry.
Poetry, we shall find, habitually adopts those symbols of thought,
and those methods of using them, which instinct and analysis agree in
choosing as most effective, and becomes poetry by virtue of doing this.
On turning back to the various specimens that have been quoted, it will
be seen that the direct or inverted form of sentence predominates in
them; and that to a degree quite inadmissible in prose. And not only
in the frequency, but in what is termed the violence of the inversions,
will this distinction be remarked. In the abundant use of figures,
again, we may recog