Alexander Pope Similes. Frank J. Wilstach, comp. 1916. A Dictionary of Similes

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Frank J. Wilstach, comp. A Dictionary of Similes. 1916.

Alexander Pope


Alternate like the moon.	1
Beauties, like tyrants, old and friendless grown, Yet hate repose, and dread to be alone.	2
To buy books only because they were published by an eminent printer, is much as if a man should buy clothes that did not fit him, only because made by some famous tailor.	3
Bright as the rising sun, in summer’s day.	4
Bright as the star that fires autumnal skies.	5
Bright, as visions of expiring maids.	6
Chaste as cold Cynthia’s virgin light.	7
True disputants are like true sportsmen, their whole delight is in the pursuit; and a disputant no more cares for the truth than the sportsman for the hare.	8
Like a wounded snake drags its slow length along.	9
Dreadful, as hermit’s dreams in haunted shades.	10
True expression, like the unchanging sun, Clears and improves whate’er it shines upon.	11
False eloquence, like the prismatic glass, Its gaudy colors spread on ev’ry place.	12
Fired like a planet on its peculiar spot, To draw nutrition, propagate, and rot.	13
False happiness is like false money; it passes for a time as well as the true, and serves some ordinary purposes; but when it is brought to the touch we find the lightness and alloy and feel the loss.	14
Haughty as the devil.	15
’Tis with our judgments as our watches,—none Go just alike, yet each believes his own.	16
Ladies, like variegated tulips, show ’T is to their changes half their charms we owe.	17
Learning is like mercury, one of the most powerful and excellent things in the world in skillful hands; in unskillful, the most mischievous.	18
Man, like the generous vine, supported lives; The strength he gains is from the embrace he gives.	19
Meek as a saint.	20
Meek as May.	21
Mild as May.	22
Mild as op’ning gleams of promised heav’n.	23
Nature, like liberty, is but restrained By the same laws which first herself ordained.	24
Our passions are like convulsive fits, which, though they make us stronger for the time, leave us weaker ever after.	25
Fir’d 1 at first sight with what the Muse imparts, In fearless youth we tempt the height of arts, While from the bounded level of our mind Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind; But more advanc’d, behold, with strange surprise, New distant scenes of endless science rise. So pleas’d at first the tow’ring Alps we try, Mount o’er the vales, and seem to tread the sky; Th’ eternal snows appear already past, And the first clouds and mountains seem the last; But these attain’d, we tremble to survey The growing labours of the lengthen’d way: Th’ increasing prospect tires our wandering eyes; Hills peep o’er hills, and Alps on Alps arise.	26
Powerful as death.	27
Praise to a young wit is like rain to a tender flower.	28
Productive as the Sun.	29
Riches, like insects, while concealed they lie, Wait but for wings, and in their season fly.	30
Shameful … as impotence in love.	31
Like some sad statue, speechless.	32
As sure as cold engenders hail.	33
Swift as an arrow soaring from the bow.	34
Unconfined, like some free port of trade.	35
Unseen, as lamps in sepulchres.	36
Wild as the winds.	37
Wise as nature.	38
Words are like leaves; and where they most abound, Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.	39

Note 1. Dr. Johnson, in his “Lives of the Poets,” says that this simile on poets is “perhaps the best the English language affords.” [back]

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