Chap. m. ANTIEKT: METAPHYSICS. 107 



dible, Homer, who has hitherto been underflood to be the moft.chafte, 

 and leaft hyperboHcal in his defcriptions, of all Poets, will be found 

 to have exaggerated through his whole narrative, almoft as much 

 as Virgil has done in fome particular paffages, fuch as that where he 

 defcribes Camilla running O'ver the unbending corn^ and fk'imming a- 

 long the main, ivithofit ivetting her feet * ; or that where he fpeaks 

 of the billows in a ftorm, as ivajhing thejiars^fo that the Trojans faiv 

 them droppifig'f ; or when he defcribes a hero lifting a ftone to throw, 

 that was no /mall part of a ?nountain J. For my own part, 1 would 

 rather believe, as fome are inclined to do in this unbelieving age 

 when every thing is called in queftion, that the whole ftory of the 

 Trojan war, the manners as well as the men, were a mere iidion 

 like Gulliver's Travels, or Arioflo's Tales of Knights and Enchan- 

 ters, than fuppofe that an author, fo remarkable for the chaftity of 

 his ftyle and the truth of his defcriptions, fhould have exaggerated 

 fo extravagantly and ridiculoufly ; for, to afcribe the adions he re- 

 lates to men fuch as we, would be altogether ridiculous, and make 

 of his work a mock heroic poem, fuch as his Battle of Frogs and 

 Mice. I think, therefore, it is better to fuppofe the whole a fidion : 

 And this difcovery will add greatly to the glory of this century, in 

 which, as we are informed by a difcourfe lately pronounced in the 

 French Academy, upon the reception, as a member, of the Marquis 

 of Condorcet, a lad, juft come from fchool or college, has more 

 knowledge, not only than all the men of antiquity, but even thaa 

 the learned of the feventeenth century §. 



O2 



The 



• iEneid. 7. Verf. 808. et fequen, 



t ^neid. 3. Veif. 567. , 



4: -^neid. 10. Verf. 127. 



S The reader will naturally aflc h<'re, whether I believe in all the florles he tells 

 of-the part the Gods and Goddefl'es aa in this war ? To which 1 aufwcr, That the 



belief 



