"The same country is once more awake-awake to the condition of negro slavery."-BROUGHAM.

§ 181. EPANODOS.

Epanodos is the repetition of a word anywhere within the sentence, either in the same sense or in different senses: “Will it be next week, or next year ?”—Patrick Henry.

"Thine island loves thee well, thou famous man,

The greatest sailor since the world began ;

Now to the roll of muffled drums,

To thee the greatest soldier comes."-TENNYSON.

"Bounce is never a thing to be proud of, but prudently calculated bounce is a thing altogether contemptible."-Pall Mall Gazette.

This figure is also called "regressio."

§ 182. EPANALEPSIS.

Epanalepsis is like epanodos, but differs in this, that while the latter is the repetition of a word anywhere in the sentence, the former is the repetition of a word in different sentences:

"He have arbitrary power! My lords, the East India Company have not arbitrary power to give him; the king has no arbitrary power to give him; your lordships have it not; nor the Commons; nor the whole legislature. We have no arbitrary power to give, because arbitrary power is a thing which neither any man can hold nor any man can give.”—BURKE.

§ 183. PLOCE.

Ploce is the repetition of the same word under different forms or with different meanings in the same sentence. It often refers to the repetition of proper names: as

"I love and honor Epaminondas; but I do not wish to be Epaminondas.” -EMERSON.

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"Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise.”—POPE.

But its more general use refers to common terms: as

'Judge not, that ye be not judged."

"We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned with contempt from the foot of the throne.” — PATRICK HENRY.

Several other figures are now combined with ploce.

Paregmenon, which is the use of several words of the same

origin:

"Judge righteous judgment."

"Drops the light drip of the suspended oar.”—Byron.

"The varnished clock that clicked behind the door."-GOLDSMITH. "All mankind love a lover."-EMERSON.

Polyptoton-a repetition with change of cases or tenses: "I dreamed a dream."

"On apples, apples; figs on figs arise."-POPE, Odyssey.

These may be considered as constituting the same figure, and the illustration of one is suitable to all.

§ 184. SYMPLOCE.

Symploce is the repetition of a word at the beginning, and of another at the end of successive clauses. Although sometimes confounded with ploce, it is really identical with epanaphora, which has already been explained and illustrated (§ 179).

§ 185. SYNONYMIA.

Synonymia is a term applied to cases where several words or phrases of similar signification follow one another:

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'Abiit, erupit, evasit."-CICERO.

"I am astonished, I am shocked."-CHATHAM.

"They are various, they are conflicting."

"For this great town, for the country at large, whose cause we are upholding, whose fight we are fighting."-BROUGHAM.

This figure often consists of words used in pairs. A remarkable example is found in the Book of Common Prayer:

"The Scripture moveth us in sundry places to acknowledge and confess our manifold sins and wickedness, and that we should not dissemble nor cloak them..."

§ 186. ALLITERATION.

Alliteration is the repetition of the same initial letter of emphatic words. Although the same word is not repeated, yet it may be classed among the iterative figures, since it tends to emphasis by means of repetition :

"The ploughman homeward plods his weary way."

"The winds in wonder wist."

"All ye that labor and are heavy laden."

Alliteration was once of far more importance than at the present day, for out of it arose the whole versification of the Teutonic race. The poetry of the Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavians still attests its capabilities in this respect. Alliterative verse lingered in English literature until the age of Chaucer, when important poems were written in it, of which the chief is "The Vision concerning Piers the Plowman." The following passage may serve as a specimen :

"I was weory of wandringe,

And wente me to reste
Undur a brod banke
By a bourne syde;
And, as I lay and leonede,
And lokede on the watres,
I slumberede in a slepyng
Hit sownede so murie."

The alliterative principle has never ceased to be present in English poetry, and may be seen in many familiar verses :

"There will we sit upon the rocks,

And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls

Melodious birds sing madrigals.”—MARLOWE.

'When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

I summon up remembrance of things past."—SHAKESPEARE.

'Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,

Thou dost not bite so nigh

As benefits forgot.

Though thou the waters warp,

Thy sting is not so sharp

As friend remembered not."-SHAKESPEARE.

"Full fathoms five thy father lies."-SHAKESPEARE.

In the ode on the

Alliteration abounds in Milton's poems. Nativity are the following examples, and many more: "Solemn strain," "lay it lowly," "winter wild," "foul deformities," "softly sliding," "waving wide," "Cynthia's seat," "sworded seraphim,” ""on hinges hung," "hideous hum," "dismal dance." The whole poem affords examples of alliteration in every stanza, the alliterated words in most cases being separated, as in the following lines:

"Nor is Osiris seen

In Memphian grove or green

Trampling the unshowered grass with lowings loud."

The later poets present equally striking examples: as"The master saw the madness rise."-DRYDEN.

"With woful measures wan Despair,

Low, sullen sounds his grief beguiled."-COLLINS. "Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell,

Or smiled when a Sabbath appeared."-Cowper.

"Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon,

How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair?"-Burns.

"She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies."-BYRON. "Britannia needs no bulwarks,

No towers along the steep;

Her march is o'er the mountain waves,

Her home is on the deep."-Campbell.

"Where furious Frank and fiery Hun

Shout in their sulphurous canopy."-CAMPBELL.
"Like a glow-worm golden

In a dell of dew."-SHELLEY.

"Best and brightest, come away,

Fairer far than this fair day."-SHELLEY.

"He clasps the crag with hooked hands,

Close to the sun in lonely lands."-TENNYSON.

"Fairer than all fancy fathoms, falser than all songs have sung."

-TENNYSON.

Alliteration is used to give emphasis to proverbs; as

"Take care of the pence, and the pounds will take care of themselves." "Love me little, love me long."

"Better be an old man's darling than a young man's drudge."

The titles of books are often alliterative: Piers Plowman; the Pilgrim's Progress; the Dairyman's Daughter; the Saint and his Saviour; Frost and Fire.

§ 187. HOMŒOTELEUTON.

Homœoteleuton is the opposite of alliteration, being the repetition of the same sound at the end of words. Formerly it was of little importance, but in modern times it has risen to be one of the leading elements in versification. For rhyme is the same as homœoteleuton, and in the presence of its superior music and power alliteration has given way. Its importance in versification will be considered elsewhere. In prose it has no place whatever at the present day, although the Greeks and Romans made use of it not unfrequently.

CHAPTER VIII.

FIGURES OF EMPHASIS ARISING FROM THE INVERSION OF WORDS.

§ 188. INVERSION.

WE have next to consider those figures which produce emphasis by a change in the position of words. This is called inversion.

The order of words differs in different languages. In some the subject stands first, then the predicate, and then the object: as, "James strikes John." In others the predicate follows the object: as, "James John strikes." Neither can be called “the natural order," for every language has its own usage in accordance with its own genius.

A marked difference is to be observed between inflected and uninflected languages as regards the order of words. In the former this is of secondary importance, since the meaning of a sentence depends upon inflection; but in the latter it is of the first importance, since the meaning depends upon position. It is chiefly in this respect that the modern languages of Europe differ from the ancient, and the English from the Latin. Thus in Latin we can say either Cæsar Pompeium vicit, or Pompeium vicit Cæsar; but in English we must say, Cæsar conquered Pompey, nor can we reverse this without reversing the meaning.