Frank J. Wilstach, comp. A Dictionary of Similes. 1916.
Pleasure
But pleasures are like poppies spread,
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed;
Or like the snow falls in the river,
A moment white—then melts for ever;
Or like the borealis race,
That flit ere you can point their place;
Or like the rainbow’s lovely form,
Evanishing amid the storm.
—Robert Burns
Pleasure, like an over-fed lamp, is extinguished by the excess of its own aliment.
—Hannah More
Pleasures like the flow’r,
Frail and fleeting ever;
Now decks the bow’r,
Now ’tis gone for ever.
—Frederick Reynolds
Pleasures are like liqueurs: They must be drunk but in small glasses.
—Romainville