[59] Insequitur nimbus peditum;
A Storm of Foot succeeds.
And in another Place,
[60] —It toto turbida cælo Tempestas telorum, & ferreus ingruit imber.
An Iron Tempest, and a Storm of Darts Hovers aloft, and blackens all the Sky.
These lofty Metaphors, however, are to be used with great Judgment, for fear they should seem too far fetch'd, and the Style more swelling than weighty.
As I am now upon the Subject of Figures, I can't help making a Remark or two on those Books of Rhetorick that are usually read in Schools. They contain, indeed, many Things of Use, and worthy of Observation: But surely there's no Necessity that an Art designed for the Refinement of the Minds of Youth, should be treated of in so rough a Method, so full of dry, logical Definitions, as must be hard for Boys to understand, and much harder to remember. Nor is there any Need of all those Sub-divisions of Figures, one under another, which, when Boys have once made themselves Masters of, before they have Judgment enough to use them, they think their Business is to adorn their little Performances with these sort of Flowers, as they call them, and fling them in, at any Rate, without any Regard to Propriety: Their Style, by being thus overcharged, as it were, instead of appearing with fresh Vigour, abounds only with disagreeable Excrescencies. A Knowledge of these Things will be much better arrived at by Experience, than Precept: And every one that is conversant with the best Authors, that reads them with Understanding, and true Relish, cannot but be acquainted with all the Figures of Speech, and the Art of using them, tho' he never heard so much as their Names, or their Definitions.
It is common with all Sorts of Writers to express the same Thing by different Modes of Speech, and such Variety is often reckoned a Proof of their Elegance. Now Poets have in this Particular a greater Liberty allow'd them, than any other Writers, for the Reason I have often mention'd, because their Works consist more in Ornament and Decoration. But the Exercise of this Liberty ought to be conducted with great Judgment and Caution; lest, by an ill Use of it, the Style grow too luxuriant. The just Medium, and the vicious Extreme, cannot be better learnt than by making a Comparison between Virgil and Ovid. Both of them, you'll see, express the same Thought different Ways; the one never fails of Beauty, the other falsly aims at it. Ovid tells you the very same Thing, in many Words, and sometimes with very little Difference between them: Virgil illustrates one Thing in general, by distinguishing its several Species or Adjuncts, and his Description of each is perfectly new. A few Examples, out of many, will make this plain. Says Ovid,
[61] Omnia pontus erat, deerant quoque littora ponto.
For all was Sea, nor had the Sea a Shore. Sandys.