MET
As the Metaphor is intended to fet things before the Eyes; it becomes fo much the more perfect, as it fhews them the more vividly, by reprefenting them in Motion and Action. A Metaphor fhould have nothing in it coarfe or mocking j nothing that may raife it above the Simpli- city oi Nature : Nor fhould it appear a Metaphor to any but thofe who view it very clofeiy. A Metaphor iliould never be carried too far j for in that Cafe, it degenerates into Puerility. Metaphors iliould always be follow'd in the fame kind 5 they become unnatural, when different Ima- ges are introduced. In all Metaphorical Dictions, there ihould be a kind of Unity, fo that the different Words Wed, may have a kind of Suitableness to each other. Dif- ferent Ideas are always abfurd : As in this Inftance j The Church wasbefieged with a Deluge of Troubles : Where the two Images, Siege and Deluge^ have no relation.
There is nothing young Writers are more faulty in, than the indifcrete ufe of Metaphors. Thofe who affect the MerveilleuXy are eternally on the Metaphorical ftrain 5 nor know any bounds or reftraint. They who underhand them belt, ufe them with the grcateft referve. Mr. Addi- fon propofes it as a Rule for Writers, to imagine their Me- taphors actually painted before them, and to view and examine thejuitnefs of their Application andAflemblages: under thofe Circumflances; throwing every thing out of the Writing, but what might be retained in the Picture. Card. Terroft prefcribes this general Rule for Metaphors 5 that they mult always defcend from the Genus to the Spe- cies i and never go backwards from the Species to the Genus : Thus we fay figuratively, the Bonds of Society; and not the human Cords which tie us together: 'Bond be- ing a Genus, andCord a Species.
The Word comes from the Greek /titTrt^agotj Tranflation, or difplacing 5 of (**-&, trahs\ and %t&* % I bear, or carry.
METAPHRASTES, or METAPHRAST, a literal Tranilator; or a Perfon who renders an Author into fome other Language Word for Word. See Translation.
A Msj-iphr^fisuCaxlly fignifies fomething more than a Pa- raphrale, or a Tranflation; in which fenfe, Metaphraji implies a Tranilator, GloiTographer, and Interpolator, all at once. See Parai j iir ase, &c.
METAPHYSICS, a Branch of Science, about whofe Nature and Idea, there is fome difference among Authors. SeeSciENCE.
Some define it that part of Science which confiders Spirits and immaterial Beings; which others chufe to diiiinguim by the Name of Pneumatics. See Spirit and Pneumatics.
Others, keeping clofcr to the Etymology of the Word, explain Metaphyjics by trans-natural, or preternatural ,or even pojt-natural Fhilofophy. In this fenfe the Word is form'd of the Prepcfition /*=to, trans, beyond, or above 5 and $von Nature, or <pm%ti, Natural.
Others, with more Propriety, conceive Metaphysics to be what fome others call Ontology, or Ontofophy, i. e. the Doctrine de Ente, or of Being, in the general, /. e. of Being quatenus Being, or Being in the Abftract. See Onto- logy and Abstraction.
In the fame view, fome Philofophers call this Science by the Name Thilofophia or Scientia generality as being the Foundation, or, as it were, the Stamen or Root from whence all the other parts of Philofophy arife, and wherein they all meet; its Object being Being in the Abftract, or general, not reftratn'd ro this or that Denomination of them 5 not to Spirit any more than Body: So that the Doctrines of Mttaphyfics, are applicable to all Beings whatever, See Ens.
The Philofophers again, are divided as to the Notion of a Science de Ente, in general. Some hold it real, precife, and folid enough to be demon ft rated 5 others judge it tco obfeure, faint, and confufed to be admitted into Philo- fophy.
Being, abftracted from every Sort or Species of Being, is certainly a very vague Term; and does not feem to give footing enough for a Science : We do not fee how it comes to affect the Mind asan Object. Add, that the common Metafhyfcs cannot demonftrate any part of its Subject, but affumes the whole : There areno Principles, or Axioms whereon to demonftrate Mttaphyfics which contain the Principles of all other Sciences. See Mathematics.
The firft who wrote profeffedly on the Subject of Me- ta-phyjics is Arijlotle. Indeed he is the firfi who ufes the Word : (astu rcr. av^yj;, is the Title of one of his Books, which fome of his Commentators will have to fignify no more than after the Books of Thyfics. M. du Hamel, taking the Prepofition we™ in the fenfe of pofi, is even of Opi- nion that the Word was coin'd by Ariftotle's Followers j and that it was utterly unknown to Ariftatle.
AriJiotWs.Metaph^fics feem to have been intended for a kind of Natural Theology. F. Mialebranch and Mr. Locke have wrote much more clearly and confiftently of Metapbyjics i
(?4? )
MET
than any of the Antients. See Unity, Mote, Truth, Duration, E£r.
METAPHISICAL, fomething belonging to Mctapby- fics. See Metaphysics.
The Word is aifo ufod to denote fomething too footle, abftract and rehned. in this fenfe we fay, inch a Rea- loning, luch a Proof, is too Metaphyfical, #c.
A MttaflyficalC.uk, is an imaginary or chimerics* Cafe, which can fcarce ever happen, or not without much diffi- culty; and which ought not to be laid down as a Rule for common Occahons.
METAPLASM, Metaplasmus, in Grammar, a Iran/mutation, or Change made in a Word, by adding retrenching, or changing a Letter or Syllable thereof.
The Word comes from the Greek unnma.truos.
METASTASIS, in Medicine, from &wlwxi, transfero, I change, or remove; fignifies the Removal of a Humour from one part, toanothcr, which is moil commonly known in nervous Cafes : fometimes alfo in the groffc Humours; the refluent Blood taking up digefted Matterfroai one part, and difpofing it upon another. See Fluxion.
METATARSUS, in Anatomy, that part of the human Sceleton, containing the middle of the Foot. See Foot.
The Metatarfas coniifts of five Bones, reaching from the Heel to the Toes; whereof that which fuftains the great Toe, is the thicket!; and that which fuftains the next Toe, the longeft. The reft grow, each fhorter than other. They are longer than the Bones of the Me- tacarpus i in other things they are like them, and are ar- ticulated to the Toes, as thefe are to the Fingers. See Metacarpus
The Word comes from fts-m, tram, and -rafow, pes, foot.
METATHESIS, Tranfpfition, a Grammatical Figure, whereby the Letters of a Word, or the Words of a Sen- tence, aretranfpofed,or ffiifted out of their natural Situa- tion. See Transposition.
The Word comes from the Greek jatm^mt, trant-pofitio.
METEMPSYCHI, an tient Heretics, who, in imitation of Pythagoras, held the Metempfychofis or Tranfmigration of Souls. See Metempsychosis.
METEMPSYCHOSIS, in the antient Philofophy, the Paffage, or Tranfmigration of the Soul of a Man, after Death, into the Body of fome other Animal. See Trans- migration.
Pythagoras and his Followers held, That after Death Men's Souls paffed into other Bodies, of this or that kind according to the manner of Life they had led. If they had been vicious, they were imprifon'd in the Bodies of Hachasi, miferable Beads, there to do Penance for fe- veral Ages; at the Expiration 'wheteof, they returned afrefh to animate Men : If they had lived virmoully, fome happier Brute, cr even a human Creature, was to be their Lot. See Pythagoreans.
What led Pythagoras into this Opinion, was, the Perfua- fion he had, that the Soul was not of a perifhable nature; whence he concluded, that it mull remove into fome o- ther Body, upon its abandoning this. Lvcan treats this Doctrine as a kind of officious Lye, contrived to mitigate the Apprehenfion of Death, by perfoading Men that they only changed their Lodging; and ccafed to live, to begin a new Life.
Reuchlin denies this Doftrine; and maintains, that the Metempfychofis of Pythagoras impfy'd nothing more than a Similitude of Manners, Defires, and Studies formerly ex- itting in fome Perfon deceafed, and now revived in ano- rher alive. Thus, when it was faid that Euphorias was revived in Pythagoras, no more was meant than that the mattial Virtue, which had /hone in Euphorbia at the time of the Trojan War, was now in fome tneafure revived in Pythagoras, by reafon of the great refpect he bore to the Jthhtx. For thofe People wondring how a Philofopher mould be fo much taken with Men of the Swotd, he pal- liated the Matter, by faying that the Soul of Euphorias, i. e. his Genius, Difpofition and Inclination, were revived in him. And this gave occafion to the Report that Eu- phorbia's Soul, who pcrifhed in the Trojan War, had ttanf- migrated into Pythagoras.
Ticinus afferts, That what Plato fpeaks of the Migration of a human Soul into a Brute, is intended allegorically; and relates mecrly to the Manners, Affections, and Ha- bits of its degenerating into a beallly Nature by the Im- purities of Vice. Serramis, tho' he allows fome force to this Interpretation, yet inclines rather to refer the Metem- pfychojis to the Refurreetion. See Resurrection.
Pythagoras is faid to have borrowed the Notion of a Metempfychofis from the Egyptians, others fay from the an- tient Brachmans. It is ftill retained among the Banians and other Idolaters of India and China; and makes the principal P'oundation of their Religion. So extremely ate they bigotted to it, that they not only forbear eating any thing that has Life, but many of them even refufe to de- fend
