is transferred to another thing to which it
could not apply in ordinary commonplace language.

By means of metaphors we express more vividly and strikingly our
feelings on any subject. We draw our metaphors from many different
sources. Many of them naturally come from Nature, for the facts of
Nature are all around us. We speak of a "sea of trouble" when we feel
that the spirit is overwhelmed by sadness so great that it suggests
the vastness of the sea swallowing up all that it meets. Or we speak
of a "storm of anger," because what takes place in a person's soul in
such a state is similar in some way to the confusion and force of a
storm in Nature. Again, an expression like a "torrent of words" is
made possible by our familiarity with the quick pouring forth of water
in a torrent. By this expression, of course, we wish to suggest a
similar quick rushing of words. Other expressions of this kind are "a
wave of anguish," the "sun of good fortune," and there are hundreds of
which every one can think.

Another source from which many metaphors have come is war, which has
given men some of the most vivid action possible to humankind. Thus we
speak of "a war of words," of a person "plunging into the fray," when
we mean that he or she joins in a keen argument or quarrel. Or we
speak more generally of the "battle of life," picturing the troubles
and difficulties of life as the obstacles against which soldiers have
to fight in battle. Shakespeare has the expression, "the slings and
arrows of outrageous fortune."

We have a great many metaphorical expressions taken from painting,
sculpture, and other arts. Thus we speak of "moulding" one's own life,
picturing ourselves as sculptors, with our lives as the clay to be
shaped as we will. Shakespeare has a similar metaphor,--

"There's a divinity which shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will."

We may, he says, roughly arrange our way of life, but the final result
belongs to a greater artist--God.

Again, we speak of "building our hopes" on a thing, of "moulding" a
person's character, of the "canvas of history," imagining history as a
picture of things past. We speak of a person describing something very
enthusiastically as "painting it in glowing colours," and so on. We
also describe the making of new words as "coining them."

But not only are the sentences we make full of metaphors, but most of
our words--all, in fact, except the names of the simplest things--are
r