36 Quotes by George Campbell

...this study, [of rhetoric] properly conducted, leads directly to an acquaintance with ourselves; it not only traces the operations of the intellect and imagination, but discloses the lurking springs of action in the heart.

It is evident, that though the mind receives a considerable pleasure from the discovery of resemblance, no pleasure is received when the resemblance is of such a nature as is familiar to every body. ... What gives the principal delight to the imagination, is the exhibition of a strong likeness, which escapes the notice of the generality of people.

There is a sort of half-formed thoughts, which we sometimes find writers impatient to give to the world, before they themselves are fully possessed of them. Now, if the writer himself perceive confusedly and imperfectly the sentiments he would communicate, it is a thousand to one, the reader will not perceive them at all.

Whereas sense and memory are conversant only about individuals, our earliest experiences imply, or perhaps generate, the notion of a species, including all those individuals which have the most obvious and universal resemblance.

There is no truth more evident than that the imagination is more strongly affected by what is perceived by the senses, than by what is conceived by the understanding.

And as to ordinary metaphors, or those which have already received the public sanction, and which are commonly very numerous in every tongue, the metaphorical meaning comes to be as really ascertained by custom in the particular language as the original, or what is called the literal meaning of the word. And in this respect metaphors stand on the same foot of general use with proper terms.

With regard to metaphor, it is certain, that in all languages there are many words which at first had one sense only, and afterwards acquired another by metaphorical application, of which words both senses are now become so current, that it would be difficult for any but an etymologist to determine which is the original and which the metaphorical.

It may be further remarked, that in some words the metaphorical sense hath justled out the original sense altogether, so that in respect of it they are become obsolete. Of this kind in our tongue are the verbs to train, to curb, to edify, to enhance, the primitive significations whereof were to draw, to bend, to build, to lift.

…in whatever light they [figurative words that have become literal] may be considered by the grammarian and the lexicographer, they cannot be considered as genuine metaphors by the rhetorician. I have already assigned the reason. They have nothing of the effect of metaphor upon the hearer. On the contrary, like proper terms, they suggest directly to his mind, without the intervention of any image, the ideas which the speaker proposed to convey by them.