Shakespear compares adverfity to a toad, and flander to the bite of a crocodile; but in fuch comparisons these abstract terms must be imagined fenfible beings. I now proceed to illuftrate by particular inftances the different means by which comparison can afford pleasure; and, in the order above established, I fhall begin with those instances that are agreeable by fuggesting fome unusual resemblance or Sweet are the ufes of Adverfity, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, As you like it, aƐt 2. Sc. 1. Gardiner. Bolingbroke hath feiz'd the wasteful : King. What pity is't that he had not so trimm'd And drefs'd his land, as we this garden dress, We We lop away, that bearing boughs may live: down. See, how the Morning opes her golden gates, Second Part Henry VI. att 2. fc. 1. Brutus. O Caffius, you are yoked with a lamb, That carries anger as the flint bears fire; Who, much inforced, fhows a hafty spark, And ftraight is cold again. Julius Cafar, alt 4. Sc. 3. Thus they their doubtful confultations dark If chance the radiant fun with farewell fweet The The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds Atteft their joy, that hill and valley rings. Paradife Loft, book 2, The last exertion of courage compared to the blaze of a lamp before extinguishing, Taffo Gierufalem, canto 19. ft, 22. As the bright stars, and milky way, Waller, None of the foregoing fimiles, as it appears to me, have the effect to add any luftre to the principal fubject; and therefore the pleasure they afford, must arise from fuggefting refemblances that are not obvious; I mean the chief pleasure; for undoubtedly a beautiful subject introduced to form the fimile affords a feparate pleafure, which is felt in the fimiles mentioned, particularly in that cited from Milton. The next effect of a comparifon in the B order order mentioned, is to place an object in a ftrong point of view; which I think is done fenfibly in the following fimiles. As when two fcales are charg'd with doubtful loads, From fide to fide the trembling balance nods, Iliad, b. xii. 521, Ut flos in feptis fecretis nafcitur hortis, Catullus. The The imitation of this beautiful fimile by Ariofto, canto 1. ft. 42. falls fhort of the original. It is alfo in part imitated by Pope *. Lucetta. I do not feek to quench your love's hot fire, But qualify the fires extreme rage, Left it should burn above the bounds of reason. Julia. The more thou damm'ft it up, the more it burns: The current, that with gentle murmur glides, Thou know'ft, being ftopp'd, impatiently doth rage; But when his fair courfe is not hindered, He makes sweet mufic with th' enamel'd ftones He overtaketh in his pilgrimage. And fo by many winding nooks he strays Then let me go, and hinder not my course; A bleffed foul doth in Elyfium. Two Gentlemen of Verona, at 2. fc. 10. * Dunciad, b. 4. 1. 405. She B 2 |