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[8] It is even possible to express facts of a somewhat unseemly character by a judicious use of metaphor, as in the following passage:1

“This do they lest too much indulgence make
The field of generation slothful grow
And choke its idle furrows.
On the whole metaphor is a shorter form of simile, while there is this further difference, that in the latter we compare some object to the thing which we wish to describe, whereas in the former this object is actually substituted for the thing.

1 Virg. Georg. iii. 1

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