A figure with the virtue of surprise

Orsino:

O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first,
Methought she purged the air of pestilence.
That instant was I turned into a hart,
And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,
E'er since pursue me.

Act I, Scene 1, lines 18-22.

Twelfth Night, William Shakespeare

So many passages in this play have become Bartlett's, figuratively if not literally.

That this book was still recommended in my high school years by English teachers so utterly dates my youth to the pre-computer, pre-Internet years.