196 Ttahan literatures Fume >. 
ing character of the ancient Arcadians. The poets. 
have adopted the same idea, traces. ‘of which are 
found in Pindar, and Homer, among the. Greeks; 
and among the Latins, not to speak of Horace, Ovid, 
Propertius and others, Virgil alone would be suffi- 
cient, who not only has taken.an opportunity to adorn. 
his bucolics with the peculiarities of Arcadia,’ but 
dedicated the greatest part of the eight book of the 
fEneid to the memory of Evander, and the praises 
of the Arcadians, acapo Sannazaro, a celebrated 
Italian and Latin poet of the sixteenth century, un- 
Ger the name of Actius Sincerus, completed what ir 
a manner had been only hinted by others. His. 
Arcadia, a composition: consisting of eclogues in verse 
and in prose, deserves to be read and admired for the 
sweetnefs. of its numbers, and the simplicity .of its. 
elocution. 
After his steps, and almost with the same pastoral’ 
simplicity, Ta/so laid the scene of his Amintain Ar- 
cadia, where likewise Guarini fixed the scenery of 
his Pastor Fido, a composition in which certainly; 
many beauties are to be found, though, unluckily, too 
much interspersed with concettz; but as for his fhep-. 
herds there is nothing pastoral in them, except the 
pellice, the crook, and the javelin, and they might 
rather be considered as refined. citizens, and knavilh 
courtiers in a.fhepherd’s disguise. 
These performances, in some respect, paved the- 
way to the institution of the modern Arcadia, which, 
although it is nothing else but an union of men of 
letters, or as it is commonly called an academy of 
belles lettres, yet it has so much distinguifhed itself, 
