of circumstances. The force of this faculty is feen in nothing more, than in its inability to confine itself to that fingle circumftance upon which the comparison is grounded: it runs out into embelliftments of additional images, which, however are to managed as not to overpower the main one. His fimiles are like pictures, where the principal figure has not only its proportion given agreeably to the original, but is alfo fet off with occafional ornaments and profpects. The fame will account for his manner of heaping a number of comparifons together in one breath, when his fancy fuggetted to him at once fo many various and correipondent images. The reader will eafily extend this obfervation to more objections of the fame kind.

If there are others which feem rather to charge him with a defect or narrownefs of genius, than an excess of it; thofe feeming defects will be found upon examination to proceed wholly from the nature of the times he lived in. Such are his groffer reprefentations of the gods, and the vicious and imperfect manners of his heroes: but I must bere fpeak a word of the latter, as it is a point generally carried into extremes, both by the cenfurers and defenders of Homer. It must be a ftrange partiality to antiquity, to think with Madam Dacier," that thofe times and manners are fo much the more excellent, as they are more contrary to ours." Who can be fo prejudiced in their favour as to magnify the felicity of thofe ages, when a fpirit of revenge and cruelty, joined with the practice of rapine and robbery, reigned through the world; when no mercy was shown but for the fake of lucre, when the greatest princes were put to the fword, and their wives and daughters nade flaves and concubines? On the other fide, I would not be fo delicate as thofe modern critics, who are bocked at the fervile offices and mean employment, in which we fometimes fee the herocs of Homer engaged. There is a pleasure in taking a view of that fimplicity, in oppofition to the luxury of fucceeding ages: in beholding momarchs without their guards, princes tending their flocks, and princeffes drawing water from the fprings. When we read Homer, we ought to reflect that we are reading the most ancient author in the heathen world; and those who confider him in this light, will double their pleasure in the perufal of him. Let them think they are growing acquainted with nations and people that are now no more; that they are ftepping almoft three thousand years back into the remotelt antiquity, and entertaining themfelves with a clear and furpriling vilon of things no where else to be found, the only true mirror of that ancient world. By this means alone their greatest obftacles will vanich; and what ufually creates their diflike, will become a fati faction.

This confideration may farther ferve to answer for the constant ufe of the fame epithets to his gods and heroes, fuch as the far-darting Phoebus, the bine-eyed Pallas, the swift-footed Achilles, &c. which fome have cenfured as impertinent and todically repeated. Thofe of the gods depended apon the powers and offices then believed to be

Preface te Ler Homer.

long to them, and had contracted a weight and veneration from the rites and folemn devotions in which they were ufed: they were a fort of attributes, with which it was a matter of religion to falute them on all occafions, and which it was an irreverence to omit. As for the epithets of great men, Monf. Eoileau is of opinion, that they were in the nature of furnames, and repeated as fuch; for the Greeks, having no names derived from their fathers, were obliged to add fome other diftinétion of cach perfon; either naming his parents exprefsly, or his place of birth, profeffion, or the like: as Alexander the fon of Philip, Herodotus of Halicarnafius, Diogenes the Cynic, &c. Homer, therefore, complying with the cuf tom of his country, ufed fuch diftinctive additions as better agreed with poetry. And, indeed, we have fomething parallel to thefe in modern times, fuch as the names of Harold Harefoot, Edmund Ironfide, Edward Longthanks, Edward the Black Prince, &c. If yet this be thought to account better for the propriety than for the repetition, I fhall add a farther conjecture. Hicfiod, dividing the world into its different ages, has placed a fourth age between the brazen and the iron enz, of heroes diftin&t from other men: a divine race, who fought at Thebes and Troy, are called dunigods, and live by the care of jupitext in the islands of the bleffed. Now, among the divine honours which were paid them, they might have this alfo in common with the gods, not to be mentioned without the folemnity of an epithet, and fuch as might be acceptable to them by its celebrating their families, actions, or qualitics.

What other cavils have been raifed against Homer, are fuch as hardly deferve a reply, but will yet be taken notice of as they occur in the courie of the work. Many have been occafioned by an injudicious endeavour to exalt Virgil; which is much the fame, as if one fhould think to raife the fuperftructure by undermining the foundation: one would imagine, by the whole courfe of their parallels, that thefe critics never fo much as heard of Homer's having written firft: a confideration which whoever compares thefe two pocts, ought to have always in his eye. Some accufe him for the fame things which they overlook or praite in the other; as when they prefer the fable and moral of the Aneis to thofe of the Iliad, for the fame reafons which might fet the Odyfles above the Eneis: as that the hero is a wifer man: and the action of the one more beneficial to his country than that of the other; or elfe they blame him for not doing what he never defigned; as becaufe Achilles is not as good and perfect a prince as Ancas, when the very moral of his poem required a contrary character: it is thus that Kapin judges in his comparison of Homer and Virgil. Others felect thofe particular paffages of Homer, which are not fo laboured as fome that Virgil drew out of them; this is the whole management of Scaliger in his Poetics. Others quarrel with what they take for low and mean expreffions, fometimes through a falfe delicacy and refinement, oftener from an ignorance of the graces of the original; and then triumph in the awkwardnefs of their

For a farther preservation of this air of fimplicity, a particular care fhould be taken to express with all plainnefs thofe moral fentences and proverbial fpeeches which are so numerous in this poet. They have something venerable, and as I may fay oracular, in that unadorned gravity and fhortnefs with which they are delivered: a grace which would be utterly loft by endeavouring to give them what we call a more ingenious (that is, a more modern) turn in the paraphrafe.

Perhaps the mixture of fome Græcifms and old words, after the manner of Milton, if done without too much affectation, might not have an ill effect in a verfion of this particular work, which moft of any other feems to require a venerable antique caft. But certainly the ufe of modern terms of war and government, fuch as platoon, campaign, junto, or the like (into which fome of his tranflators have fallen) cannot be allowable; thofe only excepted, without which it is impoffible to treat the fubjects in any living language.

There are two peculiarities in Homer's diction which are a fort of marks, or moles, by which every common eye diftinguishes him at firft fight: thofe who are not his greatest admirers look upon them as defects. and thofe who are, feem pleafed with them as beauties. I fpeak of his compound epithets, and of his repetitions. Many of the former cannot be done literally into English without deftroying the purity of our langugae. I believe fuch fhould be retained as flide cafily of themfelves into an English compound, without violence to the ear, or to the received rules of compofition; as well as thofe which have received a fanction from the authority of our beft poets, and are become familiar through their use of them; fuch as the cloud-compelling Jove, &c. As for the reft, whenever any can be as fully and fignificantly expreffed in a fingle word as in a compound one, the courfe to be taken is obvious.

As for Homer's repetitions, we may divide them into three forts; of whole narrations and speeches, of fingle fentences, and of one verfe or hemistich. I hope it is not impoflible to have fuch a regard to thefe, as neither to lofe fo known a mark of the author on the one hand, nor to offend the reader too much on the other. The repetition is not ungraceful in thofe fpeeches where the dignity of the fpeaker renders it a fort of infolence to alter his words; as in the meffages from gods to men, or from higher powers to inferiors in concerns of ftate, or where the ceremonial of religion feems to require it, in the folemn forms of prayers, oaths, or the like. In other cafes, I believe, the best rule is, to be guided by the nearnefs, or distance, at which the repetitions are placed in the original: when they follow too clofe, one may vary the expreffion; but it is a question whether a profeffed tranflator be authorised to omit any if they be tedious, the author is to answer for it.

It only remains to fpeak of the verfification. Homer (as has been faid) is perpetually applying the found to the fenfe, and varying it on every new fubject. This is indeed one of the most exquifite beauties of poetry, and attainable by very few: I know only of Homer eminent for it in the Greck, and Virgil in Latin. I am fenfible it is what may fometimes happen by chance, when a writer is warm, and fully poffeffed of his image: however, it may be reafonably believed they defigned this, in whofe verfe it fo manifeftly appears in a fuperior degree to all others. Few readers have the car to be judges of it; but those who have, will fee I have endeavoured at this beauty.

Upon the whole, I must confefs myself utterly incapable of doing juftice to Homer. I attempt him in no other hope but that which one may entertain without much vanity, of giving a more tolerable copy of him than an entire tranflation in verfe has yet done. We have only thofe of Chap man, Hobbes, and Ogilby. Chapman has taken the advantage of an immeafurable length of verfe, notwithstanding which, there is fearce any paraphrase more loose and rambling than his. He has frequent interpolations of four or fix lines, and remember one in the thirteenth book of the Odyffes, ver. 312. where he has fpun twenty verfes out of two. He is often mistaken in fo bold a manner, that one might think he deviated on purpofe, if he did not in other places of his notes infift fo much upon verbal trifles. He appears to have had a strong affectation of extracting new meanings out of his author, infomuch as to promife, in his rhyming preface, a poem of the myfteries he had revealed in Homer: and perhaps he endeavoured to ftrain the obvious fenfe to this end. His expreffion is involved in fuftain, a fault for which he was remarkable in his original writings, as in the tragedy of Buffy d'Amboife, &c. In a word, the nature of the man may account for his whole performance; for he appears from his preface and remarks to have been of an arrogant turn, and an enthusiast in poctry. His own boast of having fi

7

nished half the Iliad in lefs than fifteen weeks, fhows with what negligence his verfion was performed. But that which is to be allowed him, and which very much contributed to cover his defects, is a daring fiery fpirit that animates his tranflation, which is fomething like what one might imagine Homer himfelf would have writ before he arrived at years of difcretion.

Hobbes has given us a correct explanation of the fenfe in general; but for particulars and circumftances he continually lops them, and often omits the most beautiful. As for its being efteemed a clofe tranflation, I doubt not many have been led in to that error by the fhortnefs of it, which proceeds not from his following the original line by line, but from the contractions above mentioned. He fometimes omits whole fimiles and fentences, and is now and then guilty of mistakes, into which no writer of his learning could have fallen, but through careleffnefs. His poetry, as well as Ogilby's, is too mean for criticism.

It is a great lofs to the poetical world that Mr. Dryden did not live to tranflate the Iliad. He has left us only the first book, and a fmall part of the fixth; in which if he has in fome places not truly interpreted the fenfe, or preferved the antiquities, it ought to be excufed on account of the hafte he was obliged to write in. He feems to have had too much regard to Chapman, whofe words he fometimes copies, and has unhappily followed him in paffages where he wanders from the original. However, had he tranflated the whole work, I would no more have attempted Homer after him than Virgil, his verfion of whom (notwithstanding fome human errors) is the most noble and fpirited tranflation I know in any language. But the fate of great geniufes is like that of great minifters: though they are confeffedly the firft in the commonwealth of letters, they must be envied and calumniated only for being at the head of it.

That which, in my opinion, ought to be the endeavour of any one who tranflates Homer, is above all things to keep alive that fpirit and fire which makes his chief character: in particular places, where the fenfe can bear any doubt, to follow the ftrongest and most poetical, as moft agreeing with that character; to copy him in all the variations of his ftyle, and the different modulations of his numbers; to preferve, in the more active or defcriptive parts, a warmth and elevation; in the more fedate or narrative, a plainnefs and folemnity; in the fpeeches, a fullness and perfpicuity; in the fentences, a fhortnefs and gravity: nor to neglect even the little figures and turns on the words, nor fometimes the very caft of the periods; neither to omit nor confound any rites or cuftoms of antiquity; perhaps, too, he ought to include the whole in a fhorter compafs, than has hitherto been done by any tranflator who has tolerably preferv-, ed either the fenfe or poetry. What I would farther recommend to him, is to ftudy his author rather from his own text, than from any commentaries, how learned foever, or whatever figure they may make in the estimation of the world; to confider him attentively in comparifon with Virgil above all the ancients, and with Milton above all the moderns. Next thefe, the archbishop of Cambray's Telemachus may give him the trueft idea

of the fpirit and turn of our author, and Boffu's admirable treatife of the Epic poem, the jufteft notion of his defign and conduct. But, after all, with whatever judgment and ftudy a man may proceed, or with whatever happinefs he may perform fuch a work, he muft hope to pleafe but a few; thofe only who have at once a tafte of poetry, and competent learning. For to fatisfy fuch as want either, is not in the nature of this undertaking; fince a mere modern wit can like nothing that is not modern, and a pedant nothing that is not Greek.

What I have done is fubmitted to the public, from whofe opinions I am prepared to learn; though I fear no judges fo little as our beft poets, who are moft fenfible of the weight of this task. As for the worst, whatever they fhall pleafe to fay, they may give me fome concern, as they are unhappy men, but none as they are malignant writers. I was guided in this tranflation by judgments very different from theirs, and by perfons for whom they can have no kindnefs, if an old obfervation be true, that the ftrongeft antipathy in the world is that of fools to men of wit. Mr. Addifon was the first whofe advice determined me to undertake this tafk, who was pleafed to write to me upon that occafion in fuch terms as I cannot repeat without vanity. I was obliged to Sir Richard Steele for a very early recommendation of my undertaking to the public. Dr. Swift promoted my intereft with that warmth with which he always ferves his friend. The humanity and franknefs of Sir Samuel Garth are what I never knew wanting on any occafion. I muft alfo acknowledge, with infinite pleafure, the many friendly offices, as well as fincere criticisms of Mr. Congreve, who had led me the way in tranflating fome parts of Homer; as I wish for the fake of the world he had prevented me the reft. I muft add the names of Mr. Rowe and Dr. Parnell, though I fhall take a farther opportunity of doing juftice to the laft, whofe good nature to give it a great panegyric) is no lefs extenfive than his learning. The favour of thefe gentlemen is not entirely undeferved by one who bears them fo true an affection. But what can I fay of the honour fo many of the great have done me, while the first names of the age appear as my fubfcribers, and the moft diftinguifhed patrons and ornaments of learning as my chief encouragers? Among thefe it is a particular pleafure to me to find, that my higheft obligations are to fuch who have done mont honour to the name of poet; that his Grace the Duke of Buckingham was not difpleafed I should undertake the author to whom he has given (in his excellent effay) fo complete a praise.

"Read Homer once, and you can read no