Jacques Maritain Center :
Studies in Analogy /
by Ralph McInerny
I propose to discuss the applicability of the notion of metaphor
to the way in which philosophy and its language are said to emerge
from mythico-religious-poetic thought. "Fundamental ontology" is
borrowed from Heidegger, but I am afraid I leave with him the
meaning and importance he attributes (or attributed) to it. When I
use the phrase, I have in mind nothing more exciting than the
historical background out of which philosophy apparently came and
much of my concern here could be summed up in the question, "Are
dead metaphors the living language of philosophy?" My general
guide in the discussion that follows is Aristotle. I shall rely on
him for indications of the origins of philosophy and it is with
his conception of metaphor that I will be dealing. Later on,
certain positions of Owen Barfield will be considered at some
little length. It will end by asking whether Aristotle and
Barfield are at odds.
In a well known passage of his Metaphysics, Aristotle says
that wonder lies at the base both of myth and philosophy. Echoing
the Theatetus, he
writes, "For it is owing to their wonder that men both now begin
and at first began to philosophize; they wondered originally at
the obvious difficulties, then advanced little by little and
stated difficulties about the greater matters, e.g. about the
phenomena of the sun and stars and moon, and about the genesis of
the universe. And a man who is puzzled and wonders thinks himself
ignorant (whence even the lover of myth is in a sense a lover of
wisdom, for the myth is composed of wonders)..."{1} Wonder leads
to philosophy insofar as it expresses itself in a problem or
aporia which is resolved apodictically or, following the Oxford
version, in "the language of proof." The philosopher is thereby
opposed to mythical theologians like Hesiod. The latter, in
attempting to explain the difference between the immortals and
mortals says that the former are such due to a diet of nectar and
ambrosia. "But into the subtelties of the mythologist it is not
worth our while to inquire seriously; those, howevr, who use the
language of proof we must cross-examine and ask why, after all,
things which consist of the same element are, some of them,
eternal in nature, while others perish."{2}
Since Schelling{3} it is customary to classify
views on myth under three headings: (1) myths are first steps
toward a scientific explanation; (2) myths are deliberate
allegories and must be interpreted to get at their literal truth,
and (3) myths have their own truth which is irreducible to that of
science. It is the first attitude which is exhibited in the
passage last quoted; it would not be far-fetched to say that what
Aristotle objects to in mythical thinking is that it is not
literal. This can be gathered, it would seem, at least plausibly,
from his criticisms of Plato. For example, he writes, "But,
further, all other things cannot come from the Forms in any of the
usual senses of 'from'. And to say that they are patterns and the
other things share in them is to use empty words and poetical
metaphors."{4} To put a literal interpretation on such statements
gets one no place, Aristotle seems to suggest, and thus indirectly
suggests that philosophy demands literal language.
If Aristotle sometimes treats myth as not yet
attaining the austere standards of philosophical language, he also
adops the view that myths are allegories. "Our forefathers in the
most remote ages have handed down to their posterity a tradition,
in the form of a myth, that these bodies are gods and that the
divine encloses the whole of nature. The rest of the tradition has
been added later in mythical form with a fiew to the persuasion of
the multitude and to its legal and utilitarian expediency; they
say these gods are in the form of men or like some of the other
animals, and they say other things consequent on and similar to
these which we have mentioned. But if one were to separate the
part from these additions and take it alone - that they thought
fhe first substances to be gods, one must regard it as an inspired
utterance, and reflect that, while probably each art and science
has often been developed as far as possible, and has again
perished, these opinions, with others, have been preserved until
the present like relics of the ancient treasure. Only thus far,
then is the opinion of our ancesters and of our earliest
precessors clear to us"{5} On the assumption that the world is
eternal,{6} Aristotle further assumes that intellectual progress
is cyclic, with each science being gained and lost many times; in
the barren periods between golden ages all that is left are the
fables and myths the philosophers have concocted to proportion
difficult but important matters to plain minds.{7} Myths, then,
are seen on an analogy with exoteric writings and they have the
value of allegory. That is, symbolic discourse conceals literal
truths which can be disengaged. The interesting thing here being
that the symbols and metaphors are considered to have been
consciously constructed. One recalls Aristotles' belief that the
study of philosophy makes the construction of fables easy.{8}
When Aristotle approaches mythical accounts as
allegories, he assumes that there are literal meanings lurking
about; whether this is compatible with his view that mythological
discourse is just bad explanation need not concern us. As to
Schellings's third possibility, that myth has an irreducible truth
of its own, some approximation to this is to be found in
Aristotle's Poetics.
Were one to consult Bonitz, he would find that most of the
entries under mythos or
its variants refer to the Poetics.
It is there of course that mythos
takes on the meaning of plot. Scholars assure us that this is a
new meaning of the term and that Aristotle may be partly
responsible for it.{9} Mythos,
in the Poetics, is the
structure of events (συστασις τῶν πραγμάτων) in the tragic imitation. It is the
soul and perfection of the tragedy, its formality. We might say
that the plot is the logic of events, since at 1460a27-8, logos is used as a synonym
of mythos. It is the
principle of intelligibility of the events depicted on the stage,
thanks to which they have a beginning, a middle and an end.
This can of course be quite misleading. The mythos of the tragedy is not
an appeal to reason alone nor directly; it is what it is because
of what is done, what happens, as much as by what is said. The
speeches and the diction proper to them are but elements of the
tragedy. While talk is a kind of mimesis, the characteristic note
of drama is that actions are imitated: the mythos is said to be an
imitation of praxis.{10}
Besides this new meaning of mythos, there is another and
more familiar sense of the term operative in the Poetics. Thus, Aristotle will
say that the tragedian takes the old mythoi and imposes a mythos on them. These old mythoi are taken to be the
traditional stories and tales and we can unerstand Aristotle to be
suggesting that these tales need only be adapted for the stage.
What was narrative becomes dramatic. While this is true, it is
well to recall that tragedy has its ultimate origins in the Molpe, which included a
mimesis, a dramatic imitation, as well as the telling of a
tale.{11} That is, the Molpe
can be considered as a ritualistic song-and-dance performance. I
mention this to indicate the way in which mythos in the Poetics as the structure of
the actions with speeches subservient to deeds has its counterpart
in ealier and less conscious myths. As to the irreducible truth of
myth, at least in the limited sense myth has in the Poetics, Aristotle argues
that we should not demand of tragedy (and indeed of poetry in
general) a truth like that of science.{12}
We have said this much about the Poetics in order that our
appeal to what is there said about poetic diction and metaphor
will be seen somewhat in context. Insofar as the mythos of the tragedy
reflects in a sophisticated way primitive rituals, poetic language
is but one element of it. Thus, even in his extended use of mythos, metaphor will not be
coterminous with mythos
for Aristotle.
Here is Aristotle's definition of tragedy: "the imitation of an
action that is serious and also, as having magnitude, complete in
itself; in language with pleasurable accessories, each kind
brought in separately in the parts of the work; in a dramatic, not
in a narrative form; with incidents arousing pity and fear,
wherewith to accomplish its catharsis of such emotions.{13}" This
definition must be recalled so that the embellishments of
language, poetic diction, will be seen to be only one element of
the mimesis. When we turn to Aristotle's remarks on poetic
diction, we find him emphasizing metaphor. "But the greatest
thing by far is to have a command of metaphor. This alone cannot
be imparted by another; it is the mark of genius, for to make good
metaphors implies an eye for resemblances.{14}" What is metaphor?
Metaphor falls within a group distinguished
from familiar words and usage. The description of it is
enigmatically brief. "By a current word (kurion) I mean one which is in general use among
a people."{15} Metaphor," on the other hand, "is the application
of an alien name by transference."{16} To use the name of Y when
speaking of X is metaphorical. Four species of metaphor are
distinguished according as the name of a species is
transferred to its genus, or that of a genus to its species, or
that of one species of a genus to another species of the same
genus. Finally, a metaphor can be based on analogy. Thus, as night
is to day so death is to life. By transference, we are admonished
not to go gentle into that good night and night is called the
death of day. Sometimes such reciprocal transference is impossible
because one of the terms has no name of its own. Still,
transference in one direction is possible and then metaphor
insures, as the ancients said, that everything will have a name.
"Further, metaphors must not be far-fetched, but we must give
names to things that have none by deriving the metaphor from what
is akin and of the same kind, so that, as soon as it is uttered,
it is clearly seen to be akin."{17}
Of course Aristotle cannot give rules for the
construction of metaphors; the ability is inborn, a matter of
genius. The fittingness of a metaphor rests not just on kinship
but on the way it "puts the matter before the eyes." In the third
book of the Rhetoric
this phrase is used again and again before Aristotle, in chapter
eleven, attempts to say what he means by it. In order to put the
matter before the eyes, the metaphor must signify actuality (energia). "And, as Homer
often, by making use of metaphor, speaks of inanimate things as if
they were animate" it is by speaking of things as if they were
alive or capable of motion that acutality is achieved: Homer
"gives movement and life to all, and acutality is movement."
A word used metaphorically is not taken in its
usual sense, its literal sense. Metaphor implies, consequently, a
fund of words with literal meanings; when the poet sees something
like what X literally names and calls that something an X or
something usually associated with X, he is creating a metaphor.
Aristotle's theory of metaphor is plausible
enough when it is a question of poetic diction. We have brought it
up to ask a further question: is metaphor of any use in discerning
a rise of philosophical vocabulary? That is, can we accept without
quibble the following views? "Every word which is used to express
a moral or intellectual fact, if traced to its root, is found to
be borrowed from material appearances. Right means straight;
wrong means twisted. Spirit primarily means wind, transgression, the crossing of a
line; supercilious,
the raising of the eyebrows. We may say the heart to express emotion; the head to denote thought, and thought and emotion are words borrowed
from sensible things, and now appropriated to spiritual nature.
Most of the process by which this transformation is made is hidden
from us in the remote time when language was formed." Again:
"Throughout the whole field of language, parallel to the line of
what may be termed the material language, and expressed by the
same words, runs a line of what be termed the immaterial language.
Not that to every word that has a material import there belongs
also an immaterial one; but that to every word that has an
immaterial import, there belongs, or at least did belong, a
material one." Both of these remarks are quoted by Owen Burfield
in an article to be mentioned shortly; the first is from Emerson,
the second from Jeremy Bentham. While it is quite easy to accept
this as an explanation of some extended uses, it is not easy to
accept as historically accurate the picture this invokes of
primitive man. Barfield, perhaps better than anyone else, has
pointed out the difficulties which await one who holds that
philosophical vocabulary in its entirety arose in this way. For
his views, we might make use of his Poetic Diction, first published in 1927 and
re-issued with a new preface in 1951. I prefer the more concise
statement to be found in his essay, "The Meaning of the Word Literal."{18}
Barfield takes over from I. A. Richards the
distinction between vehicle and tenor. In the metaphor, the
vehicle is the literal meaning, the tenor is the metaphorical
meaning or reference. With respect to the metaphor so viewed,
Barfield suggests that there are two schools of thought. A first
would maintain that the tenor can be separated from the vehicle
and named literally. If the tenor could not be expressed
literally, it is maintained, it could not be called a meaning at
all. (Susanne Langer is given as representative of this school.) A
second school holds that the tenor of a meaningful metaphor cannot
always be expressed literally. "However, it may be with codes and
allegories, there are also 'creative' or 'seminal,' or anyway some
sort of metaphors and symbols, whose tenor cannot be communicated
in any other way than through the symbol, and yet whose tenor is
not purely emotive."{19}
Turning to the view expressed in the passages
from Emerson and Bentham, Barfield suggests that according to it
all nouns which today have an immaterial import and no other, e.g.
'transgression,' 'supercilious,' 'emotion,' etc. have a history
comprising four stages.
Barfield distinguishes the first from the fourth stage by calling
the former the "born" literal and the latter the "achieved"
literal. It is the achieved literal that he first questions. What
does a literal word of immaterial import mean? The Positivist
might reply that it means nothing, that it names a fictitious
entity. The four-staged history suggests that our language is a
repository of dead metaphors and that, until we get back to the
born literal, we cannot know what we mean or cannot mean anything
at all. "Now I believe," Barfield writes, "it will be found that
our whole way of thinking about the achieved literal is based on a
tacitly assumed analogy whith the born literal. We assume that it
is not the natural, simple nature of a noun to be a vehicle
with a tenor, because nouns did not begin that way. They began
life as plain labels for plain objects and that is their true
nature. It was only later, as a result of the operation of human
fancy in metaphor-making, that they came to be used for a time as
vehicles with a tenor; and when that stage is over and they have
once more achieved literalness, we feel that they have reverted to
their pristine innocence and become once more labels for objects,
even if we are firmly convinced that the new objects do not exist.
Better a fictitious entity than none at all - f a name to be the
name of."{20} What Barfield is really after, it emerges, is the
notion of the born literal.
The concept of born literalness entails that
all words of immaterial import began life with an exclusively
material reference. Barfield attemps to show that neither of the
schools he mentioned earlier can accept this. The first school,
which holds that the tenor is detachable and nameable literally,
will be hard pressed to explain the origin of the names it then
proposes to attach to the detached tenor of immaterial
import. As for the second school. Barfields's argument consists of
little more than a statement of his conviction that history
provides us with no warrant for assuming that words begin life as
literal labels for physical things. That primitive man (a concept
Barfield elsewhere describes as "that luckless dustbin of
pseudo-scientific theories") possessed a language the words of
which had only literal meanings thanks to which they referred to
material things, does not seem to be able to account for the
fittingness with which such supposed literal labels are then used
metaphorically. Barfield suggests that such terms were never
semantically aloof from the immaterial import they now have. "If
there was no prior, no 'given' affinity between the concept of
'wind' and the other immaterial concept of 'spirit,' the latter
concept must have been framed without the aid of any symbol. It
must moreover, as tenor, have been separable from its vehicle when
it acquired one. The first of these two consequences is, in my
view, epistemologically untenable on several grounds; but it is
enough that the second is pointedly inconsistent with just that
'implicational' type of metaphor (i.e. the second school above)
which is the only one we are any longer concerned with, since the
explicational type (the first school) has already been shown to be
incompatible with born literalness. If, on the other hand, there was any prior affinity
between the concept of wind
and the other (immaterial) concept, then the word must already,
from the moment of its birth, have been a vehicle with a
tenor."{21}
What Barfield is getting at is that a more
tenable view of the origins of language would have it that all
literalness is achieved, that words at the outset have neither a
purely material nor a purely immaterial import. Perhaps his point
would be better expressed by saying that words do not have at the
outset a purely material or a purely human reference: it is the
inner and outer worlds that he holds were not originally
distinguished. On this view, there is no need to decide on the
direction of basic metaphors, whether they consisted in naming the
world anthropomorphically or man cosmomorphically. If words do not
at first distinctly mean the one world or the other, then to
distinguish, to take words as having a vehicular reference to man
and a tenorial reference to the world, or vice versa, is itself an
accomplishment which constitutes
the literal meaning of the term. To relate Barfield's point to an
element in the title of this chapter, the language of primitive
man is one which reflects the fact that the subject-object
dichotomy has not yet been recognized. When it is recognized,
literal meanings become possible. Then, "That which the
physiologist takes to be the literal meaning of the word heart, for example, is no
less achieved than that which the theologian takes to be the
literal meaning of the word spirit.
Whatever else the word 'literal' means, then, it normally means
something which is the end-product of a long historical
process."{22}
There is an undeniable attractiveness in Barfield's theory. Prior
to philosophy, man's involvement in the world is such that the
line between human and physical nature is simply not clearly
drawn. There is a continuum of life, a homogeneity of man and the
world and this confusion or original unity carries over into
language. When the philologist drives words like nomos and moira and dike back to an original
agricultural reference, it is not necessary to understand that
they then had some exclusively literal meaning. One's lot in life
could be at one and the same time the field he tilled and his
portion or fate (moira).
Cornford has argued that such original mythical concepts carry
over into Pre-socratic thought and tha t it is only gradually that
words mean physical things in abstraction from their human and
religious tenor.{23} He calls our attention to the significance of
Thales' apparent identification of water, the besouled and the
divine. Thales is not confusing what he knew to be distinct, the
argument runs; the distinctions have simply not yet been made. So
too when Simplicius, passing on the one fragment of Anaximander,
comments on its poetical style, he is assuming as we need not that
Anaximander had distinguished moral judgments in human affairs
from judgments of cosmic events and is consciously speaking of the
latter in terms of the former.
The difficulty with Barfield's view is that he
seems to be suggesting that there is at the outset a simultaneous
if confused awareness of the immaterial and material. Doesn't this
fly in the face of the known history of the difficulty men
experienced in achieving the concept of the immaterial? To be able
to distinguish soul from wind is not eo ipso to hold that the soul is immaterial.
Barfield would perhaps reply: if we didn't already know the
immaterial how could we come to know it? And, indeed, his
underlying theory goes far beyond the scope of the nature of
figurative language. "In the first place, although I have been
dealing with words, it cannot said that my conclusions affect
words only. If the word on its very first apperance was already a
vehicle with a tenor, then the given affinity which I suggested
between the concept of wind and the concept of spirit must have been 'given'
in the nature of things and not by some kind of friction in the
machinery of language"{24} That the very process of naming, of
using language, involves the mind of man, which is immaterial,
though this need not be recognized to name or to use language;
that the things we first know, whatever kind of fusion we assert
obtains between the inner and the other, between man and the
world, are in the nature of things signs of and stepping stones to
the immaterial - this the Aristotelian would concede Barfield. I
think this is all his argument requires. Beyond the level of
concession, there is much to be learned from Barfield - and from
many other contemporary thinkers - on the matter of what man first
knows and consequently first talks about. If man is a
being-in-the-world, if in his knowledge and language, at their
fundamental and original level, there is a kind of mutual
implication of thing and self, the ability to use a term to speak
with precision of things as opposed to man or of man as opposed to
things, is the constitution
of literal meanings of the sort the Aristotelian notion of
metaphor requires. To speak of this as an achievement should not
blind us to the fact that to travel too great a distance from the
recognition of our fundamental involvement in the world invovles
risks which, as Heidegger has warned, affect not merely our
theories of language but our very being.
{1} A,2, 982 b 11 ff.
{2} B,4, 1000 a
19-20.
{3} Introduction a
la philosophie de la mythologie, (trad. S.
Jankélévitch) 2 vols. ubier: Paris, 1945.
{4} Metaphysics,
A,9, 991 a 20 ff.; 997 b 5-12.
{5} Lambda, 8, 1074 a 38-b14.
{6} Cf. Topics, I,
II, 104 b 8.
{7} Cf. Metaphysics,
995 a 3-6; De
coelo, 270 b 5-9; 248 a 2-13 and b3; Meteor., 339 b
19-30. Plato, Cratylus,
397C; Philebus,
16C. So too the Fathers of the Church held that
revealed mysteries should be veiled lest unbelievers
ridicule them.
{8} Rhetoric,
II, 20.
{9} Cf. Gerald Else, Aristotle's Poetics, pp. 242 ff.
{10} Poetics,
1450 a 3-4.
{11} Cf. Gilbert Murray, The Classical Tradition in Poetry.
{12} Poetics,
chap. 25.
{13} 1449 b 24-8.
{14} 1459 a 5-9.
{15} 1457 b 3-4.
{16} 1457 b 7-8.
{17} Rhetoric,
III, 2.
{18} In Metaphor
and Symbol, edited by L. C. Knights and Basil
Cottle, Butterworths Scientific Publication, London,
1960, pp. 48-63.
{19} Ibid.,
p. 49.
{20} P. 53.
{21} P. 55.
{22} Pp. 55-6.
{23} F. M. Cornford, From Religion to Philosophy.
{24} Barfield, art. cit., p. 56.
© 2011 by the Estate of Ralph McInerny. All rights reserved including the right to translate or reproduce this book or parts thereof in any form.