Page:Ovid's Metamorphoses (Vol. 1) - tr Garth, Dryden, et. al. (1727).djvu/31

Rh sider'd, which are always remarkably short, and convey some pleasing Idea to the Imagination. 'Tis in this Branch of the Poem, that he has discover'd as just a Judgment, as any of the Classicks whatever. Poets, to give a Loose to a warm Fancy, are generally too apt, not only to expatiate in their Simile's, but introduce them too frequently; by doing the first, they detain the Attention too long from the principal Narration; and by the latter, they make too frequent Breaches in the Unity of the Poem.

Those two Errors Ovid has most discerningly avoided. How short, and significant are generally his Comparisons! he fails not, in these, to keep a stiff Rein on a High-mettled Pegasus; and takes care not to surfeit here, as he had done on other Heads, by an erroneous Abundance.

His Simile's are thicker sown by much in the Fable of Salmacis, and Hermaphroditus, than in any other Book, but always short.

The Nymph clasps the Youth close to her Breast, and both sensibly grow one.

Velut si quis conducto cortice ramos Crescendo jungi, pariterque adolescere cernat. Met. B. 4.

Again, as Atalanta reddens in the Race with Hippomenes, Inque