In a dissertation on “The Anglo-Saxon Metaphor,” Professor Gummere has shown conclusively that while the metaphor, “the corner-stone of all poetical style,” is a figure native to our literature, the simile had no existence in Old English poetry, until it was brought in through the influence of the Bible and of sacred Latin poetry. He also refutes the position taken by Professor Heinzel in his essay “Ueber den Stil der altger-manischen Poesie,” that the simile existed in Old English poetry previous to the introduction of Christianity, but was given up as a concession to a foreign culture; showing that, on the contrary, only a few sporadic cases of the simile occur before the sacred writings were made known to our ancestors, and that the development of that figure was distinctly hastened by the influence of the church.