[7]
On the
other hand, when we say that a man is kindled to
anger or on fire with greed or that he has fallen into
[p. 305]
error, we do so to enhance our meaning. For none
of these things can be more literally described in its
own words than in those which we import from
elsewhere. But it is a purely ornamental metaphor
when we speak of brilliance of style, splendour of
birth, tempestuous public assemblies, thunderbolts of
eloquence, to which I may add the phrase employed
by Cicero1 in his defence of Milo where he speaks
of Clodius as the fountain, and in another place as
the fertile field and material of his client's glory.
1 Pro Mil. xiii. 34, 35.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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