"Beware the counterfeit: in Passion's flame / Hearts melt; but melt like ice, soon harder froze."

— Young, Edward (bap. 1683, d. 1765)


Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed for R. Dodsley
Date
1742
Metaphor
"Beware the counterfeit: in Passion's flame / Hearts melt; but melt like ice, soon harder froze."
Metaphor in Context
Celestial Happiness, whene'er she stoops
To visit earth, one shrine the goddess finds,
And one alone, to make her sweet amends
For absent heaven,--the bosom of a friend;
Where heart meets heart, reciprocally soft,
Each other's pillow to repose divine.
Beware the counterfeit: in Passion's flame
Hearts melt; but melt like ice, soon harder froze
.
True love strikes root in Reason, Passion's foe:
Virtue alone entenders us for life;
I wrong her much--entenders us for ever:
Of Friendship's fairest fruits, the fruit most fair
Is Virtue kindling at a rival fire,
And emulously rapid in her race.
O the soft enmity! endearing strife!
This carries friendship to her noon-tide point,
And gives the rivet of eternity.
(ll. 516-532, pp. 64-5 in CUP edition)
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Uniform title published in 9 volumes, from 1742 to 1745. At least 133 reprintings after 1745 in ESTC (1747, 1748, 1749, 1750, 1751, 1752, 1755, 1756, 1757, 1758, 1760, 1761, 1762, 1764, 1765, 1766, 1767, 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, 1773, 1774, 1775, 1776, 1777, 1778, 1779, 1780, 1782, 1783, 1785, 1786, 1787, 1788, 1789, 1790, 1791, 1792, 1793, 1794, 1795, 1796, 1797, 1798, 1800).

Edward Young, Night the Second. On Time, Death, Friendship. Humbly Inscrib'd to the Right Honourable The Earl of Wilmington (London: Printed for R. Dodsley, 1742).

Text from The Complete Works, Poetry and Prose, of the Rev. Edward Young, LL.D., 2 vols. (London: William Tegg, 1854). <Link to Google Books> Reading Edward Young, Night Thoughts, ed. Stephen Cornford (New York: Cambridge UP, 1989).
Date of Entry
06/05/2013

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.