Who o'er the herd would wish to reign,

Fantastic, fickle, fierce, and vain!

Vain as the leaf upon the stream,

And fickle as a changeful dream;

Fantastic as a woman's mood,

And fierce as Frenzy's fever'd blood.

Thou many-headed monster thing,

Oh who would wish to be thy king!

Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832): Lady of the Lake. Canto v. Stanza 30.

The other shape,

If shape it might be call'd that shape had none

Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb;

Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd,

For each seem'd either,—black it stood as night,

Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell,

And shook a dreadful dart; what seem'd his head

The likeness of a kingly crown had on.

Satan was now at hand.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book ii. Line 666.

The lion is not so fierce as they paint him.

George Herbert (1593-1632): Jacula Prudentum.

Thence to the famous orators repair,

Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence

Wielded at will that fierce democratie,

Shook the arsenal, and fulmin'd over Greece,

To Macedon, and Artaxerxes' throne.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Regained. Book iv. Line 267.

Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears

Her snaky crest.

James Thomson (1700-1748): The Seasons. Spring. Line 996.