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THE

ILIAD

OF

HOMER.

Tranflated by Mt. POPE.

Te fequor, O Graia gentis Decus!,inque tuis nunc
Fixa pedum pono preffis veftigia fignis:

Non ita certandi cupidus, quàm propter amorem,
Quòd te imitari aveo-

The SECOND EDITION.

LUCRET.

LONDON:

Printed by W. BOWYER, for BERNARD LINTOT
between the Temple-Gates. M DCC XX.

T

PREFAC E.

H

OMER is univerfally allow'd to have had the greatest Invention of any writer whatever. The praise of judgment Virgil has juftly contefted with him, and others may have their pretenfions as to particular excellencies; but his Invention remains yet unrival'd. Nor is it wonder if he has ever been acknowledg'd the greatest of poets, who moft excell'd in that which is the very foundation of poetry. It is the Inven-tion that in different degrees diftinguishes all great Genius's: The utmoft ftretch of human ftudy, learning, and induftry, which mafter every thing befides, can never attain to this. It furnishes art with all her materials, and without it, Judgment it felf can at best. but fteal wifely: For Art is only like a prudent fteward that lives on managing the riches of Nature. Whatever praises may be given to works of judg ment, there is not even a single beauty in them but is owing to the invention: As in the most regular gardens, however art may carry the greatest appearance, there is not a plant or flower but is the gift of nature. The firft can only reduce the beauties of the latter into a more obvious figure, which the common eye may better take in, and is therefore

A. 4

more

more entertain'd with them. And perhaps the reafon why moft Criticks are inclin'd to prefer a judicious and methodical genius to a great and fruitful one, is, because they find it easier for themselves to purfue their obfervations through an uniform and bounded walk of art, than to comprehend the vast and various extent of nature.

Our author's work is a wild paradife, where if we cannot fee all the beauties fo diftinctly as in an order'd Garden, it is only because the number of them is infinitely greater. 'Tis like a copious nursery which contains the feeds and firft productions of every kind, out of which those who follow'd him have but felected fome particular plants, each according to his fancy, to cultivate and beautify. If fome things are too luxuriant, it is owning to the richness of the foil; and if others are not arriv'd to perfection or maturity, it is only because they are over-run and oppreft by thofe of a stronger nature.

It is to the ftrength of this amazing invention we are to attribute that unequal'd fire and rapture, which is fo forcible in Homer, that no man of a true poetical fpirit is mafter of himself while he reads him. What he writes is of the moft animated nature imaginable; every thing moves, every thing lives, and is put in action. If a council be call'd, or a battel fought, you are not coldly inform'd of what was faid or done as from a third perfon; the reader is hurry'd out of himself by the force of the Poet's imagination, and turns in one place to a hearer, in another to a spectator. The courfe of his verses resembles that of the army he describes,

Οἱ δ ̓ ἴσαν, ώσει το πυρὶ χθὺν πᾶσα νέμοιο.

They pour along like a fire that fweeps the whole earth before it. 'Tis however remarkable that his fancy, which

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