Milton is criticizing his critics in this sonnet. He argued that divorce was sensible when two people were incompatible. This went against the strict Puritan sensibilities of his time. So, he responds in this sonnet. He says that he tried to remove people's mental limits ("clogs") but in response, his critics simply gave him ancient ideas and justifications, and sounded like a barbarous noise of animals. These uses of clogs and comparing the critics to...
Milton is criticizing his critics in this sonnet. He argued that divorce was sensible when two people were incompatible. This went against the strict Puritan sensibilities of his time. So, he responds in this sonnet. He says that he tried to remove people's mental limits ("clogs") but in response, his critics simply gave him ancient ideas and justifications, and sounded like a barbarous noise of animals. These uses of clogs and comparing the critics to animals are all metaphoric.
But he does begin line 5 with "As" and this indicates a potential simile. He compare his critics to the peasants in the myth of Latona. Peasants would not let Latona drink from their pond, so she turned them into frogs. This seems to be the only simile in the sonnet. This is also allegorical because it refers to a story outside of the poem. He compares the peasants complaining about sharing the water to his critics complaining about his defense of sensible divorce and sensible thinking.
Milton adds that giving a reasonable defense of divorce is essentially casting pearls to hogs. In other words, metaphorically, this is like throwing them away. The pearls will be trampled or eaten by the senseless hogs. Another metaphor is the notion of missing the mark. His critics have "rove" and this means that they have shot away from the mark. In other words, they have missed his point.
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