Cohesion, the main form of discoursal coherence, has traditionally been analyzed from the perspective of functional linguistics and its study mainly focuses on surface explicit cohesive devices. We hold that it is of much higher explanatory power to study discoursal coherence from the point of view of cognitive linguistics and the construction of discoursal coherence has been restricted by the cognitive principles like iconicity, cognitive metaphor and cognitive metonymy. Based upon the above analysis, the article discusses show such cognitive principles act as cohesive devices and play a role in the formation of discoursal coherence.
