ent accounts; as we strike out fparks of fire by the collifion of flints and steel. Racine makes Pyrrhus fay to Andromaque, Vaincu, chargé de fers, de regrets confumé, And Oreftes, in the fame ftrain: Que les Scythes font moins cruels qu' Hermione. Similes of this kind put one in mind of a ludicrous French fong: Je croyois Janneton Auffi douce que belle: Je croyois Janneton Plus douce qu'un mouton ; Helas! helas! Elle est cent fois, mille fois, plus cruelle Que n'eft le tigre aux bois. Again, Helas! l'amour m'a pris, Comme le chat fait la fouris. A vulgar Irish ballad begins thus: I have as much love in store As there's apples in Portmore. Where the fubject is burlefque or ludicrous, fuch fimiles are far from being imHorace fays pleasantly, proper. Quanquam tu levior cortice. L. 3. ode 9. And Shakespear, In breaking oaths he's stronger than Hercules. And this leads me to obferve, that befide the foregoing comparisons, which are all ferious, there is a fpecies, the end and purpose of which is to excite gaiety or mirth. Take the following examples. Falstaff, fpeaking to his page: I do here walk before thee, like a fow that hath overwhelmed all her litter but one. Second Part Henry IV. at 1. fc. 4. I think he is not a pick-purse, nor a horse-stealer; but for his verity in love, I do think him as concave concave as a cover'd goblet, or a worm-eaten nut. As you like it, aƐt 3. sc. 10. This fword a dagger had his page, And therefore waited on him so Hudibras, canto 1. Description of Hudibras's horse : He was well stay'd, and in his gait As if he griev'd to touch the ground: Was not by half so tender hooft, Nor trod upon the ground fo foft. Canto 1. Honour is, like a widow, won With brifk attempt and putting on, G With With entering manfully, and urging; The fun had long fince in the lap Canto 1. Part 2. canto 2. Books, like men, their authors, have but one way of coming into the world; but there are ten thoufand to go out of it, and return no more. Tale of a Tub. And in this the world may perceive the difference between the integrity of a generous author, and that of a common friend. The latter is obferved to adhere close in profperity, but on the decline of fortune, to drop fuddenly off: whereas the generous author, juft on the contrary, finds his hero on the dunghill, from thence by gradual fteps raifes him to a throne, and then immediately withdraws, expecting not fo much as thanks for his pains. Tale of a Tub. The most accomplish'd way of ufing books at prefent is, to ferve them as fome do lords, learn Tale of a Tub. their titles, and then brag of their acquaintance. Box'd in a chair, the beau impatient fits, While fpouts run clatt'ring o'er the roof by fits; The leather founds; he trembles from within. Defcription of a city shower. Swift. Clubs, diamonds, hearts, in wild disorder seen, Rape of the Lock, canto 3. He does not confider, that fincerity in love is as much out of fashion as fweet fnuff; no body takes it now. Careless Hufband. G 2 Lady |