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

Walter Harte

Like ray-collecting mirrors, beams.

Blooming as a bridal maid.

Court favors lie above the common road by modesty and humble virtue trod; like trees on precipices, they display fair fruit, which none can reach but birds of prey.

Delightful as the all-enlivening sun.

Fair as the Spring.

Fair as the summer’s evening skies.

Idle, as the dreams of maids.

Loud as when blust’ring Boreas issues forth,
To bring the sweeping whirlwind from the north.

Mild as the voice of comfort to despair.

Minds like fine pictures are by distance proved,
And objects proper, only as removed.

Num’rous as birds that o’er the forest play.

Reason, like virtue, in a medium lies:
A hair-breadth more might make us mad, not wise.

Sensitive as truth in Heaven.

Smiles, like meteors of the night,
Just give one flash of momentary light.

Sudden as kindling flames arise.

Transient as vapours glimm’ring thro’ the glades.

Trite as Priam’s tale, and twice as old.

Vain as the sick man’s vow, or young man’s sigh.

Wit, like an insect clamb’ring up a wall,
Mounts to one point, and then of course must fall,
No wiser, if its pains proceed, than end,
And all its journey to descend.

Wits, like misers, always covet more.

Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD