The mingling tempest waves its gloom.
Autumn, 337.
A various sweetness swells the gentle race.
Ibid. 640.
A sober calm fleeces unbounded ether.
Ibid. 967.
The distant water-fall swells in the breeze.
Winter, 738.
In the tenth place, When a subject is introduced by its proper name, it is absurd to attribute to it the properties of a different subject to which the word is sometimes apply’d in a figurative sense:
Hear me, oh Neptune! thou whose arms are hurl’d
From shore to shore, and gird the solid world.
Odyss. ix. 617.
Neptune is here introduced personally, and not figuratively for the ocean: the description therefore, which is only applicable to the ocean, is altogether improper.
It is not sufficient, that a figure of speech be regularly constructed, and be free from blemish: it requires taste to discern when it is proper when improper; and taste, I suspect, is the only guide we can rely on. One however may gather from reflection and experience, that ornaments and graces suit not any of the dispiriting passions, nor are proper for expressing any thing grave and important. In familiar conversation, they are in some measure ridiculous. Prospero in the Tempest, speaking to his daughter Miranda, says,
The fringed curtains of thine eyes advance,
And say what thou seest yond.
No exception can be taken to the justness of the figure; and circumstances may be imagined to make it proper: but it is certainly not proper in familiar conversation.