The Speeches are to be confider'd as they flow from the characters, being perfect or defective as they agree. or disagree with the manners of those who utter them. As there is more variety of characters in the Iliad, so there is of speeches, than in any other poem. Every thing in it has manners (as Ariftotle expreffes it) that is, every thing is acted or spoken. It is hardly credible in a work of fuch length, how small a number of lines are employ'd in narration. In Virgil the dramatic part is lefs in proportion to the narrative; and the fpeeches often confift of general reflexions or thoughts, which might be equally juft in any perfon's mouth upon the fame occafion. As many of his perfons have no apparent characters, fo many of his fpeeches escape being apply'd and judg'd by the rule of propriety. We oftner think of the author himfelf when we read Virgil, than when we are engag'd in Homer: All which are the effects of a colder invention, that interefts us lefs in the action defcrib'd: Homer makes us hearers, and Virgil leaves us readers. If in the next place we take a view of the fentiments, the fame prefiding faculty is eminent in the fublimity and fpirit of his thoughts. Longinus has given his opinion, that it was in this part Homer principally excell'd. What were alone fufficient to prove the grandeur and excellence of his fentiments in general, is that they have fo remarkable a parity with thofe of the Scripture: Duport, in his Gnomologia Homerica, has collected innumerable inftances of this fort. And it is with juftice an excellent modern writer allows, that if Virgil has not fo many thoughts that are low and vulgar, he has not fo many that are fublime and noble; and that the Roman author feldom rifes into very aftonishing fentiments where he is not fired by the Iliad, If we obferve his defcriptions, images, and fimiles, we fhall find the invention ftill predominant. To what what else can we afcribe that vaft comprehenfion of images of every fort, where we fee each circumftance and individual of nature fummon'd together, by the extent and fecundity of his imagination; to which all things, in their various views, prefented themfelves in an inftant, and had their impreflions taken. off to perfection, at a heat? Nay, he not only gives us the full profpects of things, but feveral unexpected peculiarities and fide-views, unobferv'd by any painter but Homer. Nothing is fo furprizing as the defcriptions of his battels, which take up no lefs than half the Iliad, and are fupply'd with so vast a variety of incidents, that no one bears a likeness to another; fuch different kinds of deaths, that no two heroes are wounded in the fame manner; and fuch a profufion of noble ideas, that every battel. rifes above the laft in greatnefs, horror, and confufion. It is certain there is not near that number of images and defcriptions in any Epic Poet; tho every one has affifted himself with a great quantity out of him: And it is evident of Virgil especially, that he has fcarce any comparisons which are not drawn from his matter. If we defcend from hence to the expreffion, we fee the bright imagination of Homer fhining out in the moft enliven'd forms of it. We acknowledge him the father of poetical diction, the first who taught that language of the Gods to men. His expreffion is like the colouring of fome great mafters, which difcovers itself to be laid on boldly, and executed with rapidity. It is indeed the strongest and most glowing imaginable, and touch'd with the greateft fpirit. Ariftotle had reafon to fay, He was the only Poet who had found out living words; there are in him more daring figures and metaphors than in any good author whatever. An arrow is impatient to be on the wing, a weapon thirts to drink the blood of an enemy, and the like. Yet his expreffion is never too big for the fenfe, fenfe, but juftly great in proportion to it: "Tis the fentiment that fwells and fills out the diction, which rifes with it, and forms itself about it. For in the fame degree that a thought is warmer, an expreflion will be brighter; and as that is more ftrong, this will become more perfpicuous: Like glafs in the furnace which grows to a greater magnitude, and refines to a greater clearnefs, only as the breath within is more powerful, and the heat more intenfe. To throw his language more out of profe, Homer feems to have affected the compound epithets. This was a fort of compofition peculiarly proper to poetry, not only as it heighten'd the diction, but as it affifted and fill'd the numbers with greater foung and pomp, and likewife conduced in fome measure to thicken the images. On this laft confideration I cannot but attribute these also to the fruitfulness of his invention, fince (as he has manag'd them) they are a fort of fupernumerary pictures of the perfons or things to which they are join'd. We fee the motion of Hector's plumes in the epithet Kogudaís, the landfcape of mount Neritus in that of Εἰνοσίφυλλον, and fo of others; which particular images could not have been infifted upon fo long as to exprefs them in a defcription (tho' but of a fingle line) without diverting the reader too much from the principal action or figure. As a metaphor is a fhort fimile, one of thefe Epithets is a fhort description. Laftly, if we confider his verfification, we shall be fenfible what a share of praise is due to his invention in that. He was not fatisfy'd with his language as he found it fettled in any one part of Greece, but fearch'd thro' its differing dialects with this particular view, to beautify and perfect his numbers: He confider'd thefe as they had a greater mixture of vowels or confonants, and accordingly employ'd them as the verfe requir'd either a greater fmoothness or ftrength. What What he most affected was the Ionic, which has a peculiar fweetnefs from its never using contractions, and from its cuftom of refolving the diphthongs into two fyllables, fo as to make the words open themfelves with a more spreading and fonorous fluency. With this he mingled the Attic contractions, the broader Doric, and the feebler Holic, which often rejects its afpirate, or takes off its accent; and compleated this variety by altering fome letters with the license of poetry. Thus his measures, instead of being fetters to his fenfe, were always in readinefs to run along with the warmth of his rapture, and even to give a farther representation of his notions, in the correfpondence of their founds to what they fignify'd. Out of all these he has deriv'd that harmony, which makes us confefs he had not only the richest head, but the finest ear in the world. This is fo great a truth, that whoever will but confult the tune of his verses, even without understanding them (with the fame fort of diligence as we daily fee practis'd in the cafe of Italian Opera's) will find more sweetness, variety, and majesty of found, than in any other language or poetry. The beauty of his numbers is allow'd by the criticks to be copied but faintly by Virgil himself, tho' they are fo jult to afcribe it to the nature of the Latin tongue: Indeed the Greek has fome advantages both from the natural found of its words, and the turn and cadence of its Verfe, which agree with the genius of no other language. Virgil was very fenfible of this, and ufed the utmoft diligence in working up a more intractable language to whatfoever graces it was capable of; and in particular never fail'd to bring the found of his line to a beautiful agreement with its fenfe. If the Gracian poet has not been fo frequently celebrated on this account as the Roman, the only reafon is, that fewer criticks have understood one language than the other. Dia yfius of Halicarnaffus has pointed out many of our author's beauties in this kind, in his treatise of the Compofition of Words, and others will be taken notice of in the course of my Notes. It fuffices at present to obferve of his numbers, that they flow with fo much ease, as to make one imagine Homer had no other care than to transcribe as faft as the Mufes ditated; and at the fame time with fo much force and infpiriting vigour, that they awaken and raise us like the found of a trumpet. They roll along as a plentiful river, always in motion, and always full; while we are born away by a tide of verfe, the moft rapid, and yet the most smooth imaginable. Thus on whatever fide we contemplate Homer, what principally ftrikes us is his invention. It is that which forms the character of each part of his work; and accordingly we find it to have made his fable more extensive and copious than any other, his manners more lively and ftrongly marked, his fpeeches more affecting and tranfported, his fentiments more warm and fublime, his images and defcriptions more full and animated, his expreffion more rais'd and da ring, and his numbers more rapid and various. I hope, in what has been faid of Virgil with regard to any of thefe heads, I have no way derogated from his character. Nothing is more abfurd or endless, than the common method of comparing eminent writers by an oppofition of particular paffages in them, and forming a judgment from thence of their merit upon the whole. We ought to have a certain knowledge of the principal character and diftinguishing excellence of each: It is in that we are to confider him, and in proportion to his degree in that we are to admire him. No author or man ever excell'd all the world in more than one faculty, and as Homer has done this in invention, Virgil has in judgment. Not that we are to think Homer wanted judgment,. because |