Book 8
3.80
There is also another simile in the same speech, Pro Mur. xvii. 36. which is almost worthy of a poet, but in virtue of its reciprocal representation is better adapted for ornament: For as tempests are generally preceded by some premonitory signs in the heaven, but often, on the other hand, break forth for some obscure reason without any warning whatsoever, so in the tempests which sway the people at our Roman elections we are not seldom in a position to discern their origin, and yet, on the other hand, it is frequently so obscure that the storm seems to have burst without any apparent cause.
3.81
We find also shorter similes, such as Wandering like wild beasts through the woods, or the passage from Cicero's speech against Clodius: Now lost. He fled from the court like a man escaping naked from a fire. Similar examples from everyday speech will occur to everyone. Such comparisons reveal the gift not merely of placing a thing vividly before the eye, but of doing so with rapidity and without waste of detail.
