Definition of Metaphor
The Tempest brims with ingenious metaphors. In Act 2, Scene 1, for instance, Antonio uses metaphors and an instance of personification in his effort to convince Sebastian to murder his brother, Alonso. Speaking about Alonso, Antonio says:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Whom I, with this obedient steel, three inches of it,
Can lay to bed for ever; whiles you, doing thus,
To the perpetual wink for aye might put
This ancient morsel, this Sir Prudence, who
Should not upbraid our course. For all the rest,
They'll take suggestion as a cat laps milk;
They'll tell the clock to any business that
We say befits the hour.
Shakespeare uses the theater as a metaphor for life in many of his plays, and The Tempest is no exception. In Act 2, Scene 1, Antonio describes his harrowing experience of the tempest:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We all were sea-swallow'd, though some cast again,
And by that destiny to perform an act
Whereof what's past is prologue, what to come
In yours and my discharge