The Rover: Soliloquy 3 key examples

This first line of the soliloquy is a rhetorical question in which Belvile expresses that he's tired of complaining about his misfortune—something he feels that he's been doing a lot recently. Instead of referring back to fortune with a "which" in the second clause, he refers to it with a "who." He then claims that fortune has decided never to turn with smiles upon him. "Smile upon" is a phrasal verb that means to regard favorably. Taken literally, the smiling upon contributes to the personification of fortune. Taken figuratively, the smiling upon underlines Belvile's impression of his own bad luck.

This personification returns at the very end of the same scene, when Belvile apostrophizes fortune in another soliloquy:

Fantastic Fortune, thou deceitful light,

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That cheats the wearied traveller by night,

Though on a precipice each step you tread,

I am resolved to follow where you lead. 

Belvile addresses fortune and compares it to a deceitful light that misleads travelers at night. In this metaphor, the traveler in question is himself—he feels that he consistently finds himself in challenging situations that aren't his own fault. However, it is also possible that he's suggesting that Antonio is being misled by fortune's deceitful light. Earlier in the scene, Antonio has instructed Belvile to fight on his behalf in a duel over a maid. Belvile is sure he is speaking of Florinda. If fortune is playing tricks on Belvile, it is without a doubt also playing tricks on Antonio, as he doesn't realize he is asking his rival for Florinda to represent him in a duel over her.

Belvile concludes his apostrophic personification of fortune in the last two lines, stating that though it may take him down dangerous paths, he has no choice but to follow it and see where it will lead him. The character's personification of fortune in these two soliloquies underlines that he is both frustrated with and accepting of his circumstances. Ultimately, Belvile is a brave and experienced Cavalier who recognizes that one cannot have control over all that happens in one's life.

In the beginning of the soliloquy, Angelica reveals that Willmore has made her lose her sense of self. Although she's been with many men, he's the first man to whom she has given her heart—she even stopped hanging her painting out after falling in love with him. In the line "I had forgot my name, my infamy," Angelica admits that he made her forgot that she is a courtesan and that men see her differently on account of it. These realizations underline the vulnerability of love, as well as her internalization of the classist misogyny held by the male characters around her.

The tone promptly shifts at the end of the soliloquy, however. Interrupting her grief over loving and losing Willmore, she vows revenge:

– Then since I am not fit to be beloved,

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I am resolved to think on a revenge

On him that soothed me thus to my undoing.

Willmore's dishonesty and lust has devastated Angelica and robbed her of her self worth. Although she initially feels powerless against him, she ends her soliloquy on a powerful note. Later in the play, she threatens Willmore with a pistol, telling him she wants to kill him "for the public safety" of all women as well as for her "own private injuries." Willmore may have reminded Angelica of her powerlessness, but it also empowered her to defend herself and women in both words and action.

Blunt's series of similes here is rather unique. Whereas similes often involve a certain ambiguity as to the quality shared by the two things being compared—leaving it to the reader to infer what is meant—he explicitly states what it is he relates to in a physician, a churchman, and a poet. In other words, Blunt doesn't simply say he feels like a physician, but says he feels as faithless as a physician. Unlike similes that contain a lone "as," these similes consist of an "as [...] as" correlative structure that spells out the point of comparison. 

However, the quality he pairs with each of the comparanda is contrary to what the audience would expect. Normally, one would call a physician faithful, a churchman charitable, and a poet good-natured. This figure of speech—when the reader finds the latter part of a sentence or text unexpected—is called paraprosdokian. In his soliloquy, Blunt pairs similes with paraprosdokian to prove his profound disillusionment with the world.

When the audience first meets Blunt, he is a debauched man who neither seems interested nor capable of intense romantic attachment. When he falls for Lucetta and her scheme, he believes—with pitiful delight—that he has forever been changed. Now, after realizing that Lucetta was only after his money, he is more cynical than ever. As evidenced by Blunt's use of paraprosdokian, these experiences have turned the world on its head for him. His views of physicians as faithless, churchmen as uncharitable, and poets as ill-natured emphasize his vitriolic distrust of the world.