75 G 
POE 
uompofition. Tliofe who confider Romance to be entirely 
the invention of the middle ages, have only to read this 
work. In it the fame wandering, the fame miraculous 
adventure, improbable courage and impodible power, 
fupernatural agency, and digrefUve ftyle, are apparent. If 
we did not fee, in the very nature of man, a reafon why 
this ftyle fliould fpontaneoufly arife, we might trace to 
the Eaft, both the Grecian Romance, and that of the 
middle ages. 
Whoever perufes the Odyftey, will be convinced of 
the truth of the remark made by Longinus, that in this 
poem Homer may be compared to the fetting fun, whofe 
grandeur ftill remains without the heat of his meridian 
beams. It contains none of thofe fublime pictures, heroic 
characters, of thofe lively fcenes and animated paffages, 
of that impaffioned eloquence of fentiment and language, 
which fucceed each other in the Iliad with fo much ener¬ 
gy and vigour. The Odyftey is perhaps a more amufing 
work, as poffefling greater variety. It contains many 
interefting ftories and fome beautiful paffages. The fame 
defcriptive and dramatic genius, and the fame fertility of 
invention, are ftill obfervable. But the fables of the Iliad 
are calculated to ftfike and exalt the imagination ; while 
the other, by defcending from the dignity of gods and 
heroes, are more likely to difgiift and degrade it. There 
are many low defcriptions in the Odyftey; and the inde¬ 
cent broils in which the hero is engaged, are unworthy 
of his charafter. 
The march of this poem is feeble and languid. The 
iaft twelve bocks, after Ulyfles is landed in Ithaca, are te¬ 
dious and tin interefting. The poem proceeds from one 
adventure to another, without a ftngle incident that 
either arrefts our attention or excites our intereft. After 
the arrival'of the hero, there is nothing which anfwers 
the expectations of the reader. He affumes an ignoble 
dlfguife ; and is either occupied in the meaneft offices or 
difgraced by ingloriousdifputes. Admitting it was ne- 
cefiary that Ulyfles fliould experience fcenes of diftrefs, 
that he might extricate himfelf with greater glory to con¬ 
found his enemies, he fliould have been preferved from 
the abjeCt degradation in which he is often funk, and by 
means more worthy of his character. The deftruction of 
Penelope’s lovers is more poetical; but the intereft of the 
combat is weakened by the too fudden interference of 
Minerva with her aegis, by which the danger of Ulyfles is 
-too vifibly diminifhed, and his victory rendered too cer¬ 
tain. The difcovery which lie makes of himfelf to Eury- 
clea. his nurfe, is tender and affecting ; but we think that 
in the interview between Ulyffes and Penelope, the poet 
lias failed. This meeting, fo long and fo anxioufly ex¬ 
pected, is cold and formal, and produces none of thofe 
emotions which fuch a fcene was calculated to infpire. 
Penelope is too cautious and diftruftful ; and the dif¬ 
covery is at length effected, not, as we might have fup- 
pofed, in confequence of the valour of her Jiufband or the 
intervention of fome favouring deity, but by a ftratagem 
very unworthy of the Epic, the defcription of the nup¬ 
tial bed, the ftrufture of which is known only to them- 
fel ves. 
We may fairly omit all notice of the fmaller poems 
which have borne Homer’s name, as their authenticity is 
now oppugned. 
Cotemporary, or nearly fo, with Homer, was Hefiod. 
In the works of this poet is generally included a poem 
called the Shield of Hercules, which has little beauty, and 
which evidently is not in his ftyle. The only works 
worth mention that he has left, are, his “ Works and 
Hays” and his “ Theogony.” With refpeCf to the 
former, there has been a difpufe among the critics and 
commentators, refpeCting the title. The firft part they 
cal! Egya (Works), and the fecond Hp.qai (Days); others 
call the firft Egya v.a ,i Hf/.epai, and the two only, 
which part conlifts of no more than fixty-four lines. In 
fome editions, this divifion is placed at the end of the 
litoral and religious precepts; but, according to Grtevius, 
5 
TRY. 
there was no fuch diftin&ion in the old manufcripts. 
Whether thefe divifions exifted or not in the old copies, 
is of little importance ; they certainly contribute to the^ 
eafe of the reader, and do not injure the original text. 
It begins with the fable of Pandora; and, if it be origi¬ 
nally invented by him, he may claim the merit of a fertile 
imagination ; he is at lead the firft writer by whom the 
fable is mentioned ; as well as the birth of Venus, and 
that of the nine Mufes, the daughters of Mnemofyne and 
Jupiter. The allegory of Pandora is followed by a de- 
fcription of the different ages of the world, which he di¬ 
vides into five, inftead of the ufual number of four. 
Thefe are the golden age, the filver age, the brazen age, 
the age of the demi-gods and heroes, and the iron age, 
which was the age in which Hefiod himfelf wrote. After 
this mythological opening, he addreffes a moral difcourfe 
to his brother Perfes, which is followed by precepts in the 
art of tilling the earth, interfperfed with leffons of wifdom. 
At the clcfe of the poem he makes a curious diftinCtion 
between the different days of the month, pointing out 
the particular fun&ions which fliould be appropriated to 
each. He informs us, that marriages fhould take place 
on the fourth of the month, that ftieep may be fhorn 
on the eleventh or twelfth, but that the twelfth is 
better; that the tenth is molt favourable to the genera¬ 
tion of males, and the fourteenth to that of females; and 
many other inftru&ions equally lingular and fuperftitious. 
The Works and Days is the earlieft poem we have upon 
agriculture. It contains many admirable precepts, de¬ 
livered in a ftyle of great fimplicity and purity. But it 
has the defeft, when confidered as a poem, of being too 
minute and dry. The inftruflions are conveyed without 
either method or order ; the ftyle is uniformly even and 
temperate ; as a didaftic poem it is rather a flcetch of the 
rules upon which agriculture is founded, than a regular 
treatife upon tile fcience itfelf. The Theogony, or Birth 
of the Gods, is a fort of poetical review of all the deities 
which graced the ancient Mythology. Hefiod and Homer 
were the firft who introduced a theogony among the 
Greeks ; the firft who gave a name to the gods, afcribing 
to them honours and fun&ions, and giving particular de¬ 
fcriptions of their perfons. Hefiod begins with the firft 
principle of the heathen fyftem, that Chaos was the parent 
of all, and Heaven and Earth the parents of all vifible 
things. That Heaven was the father, fays Plutarch in 
his Inquiry after God, appears from his pouring down the 
waters which have the fpermatic faculty ; and Earth the 
mother, becaufe ftie generates and brings forth. This, 
according to Plutarch and others, was the origin of that 
multiplicity of gods andgoddefles which forms the reli¬ 
gious fyftem of the ancients. The delign of the poet 
was to give a catalogue of the deities who were in any 
fenfe efteemed as fuch in the age in which lie lived, 
whether fabulous, hiftorical, or phyfical. But it may be 
remarked that, even where a ftory took its rife from 
hiftory or fable, he labours to reduce it to natural caufes. 
The one half of the Theogony is a continual nomenclature 
of gods and goddefles, of every rank and fpecies. It is ob¬ 
fervable that this poet, whofe ftyle is.in general fo foft and 
eafy, affumes towards the end of the poem a degree of un¬ 
expected vigour and majefty, when he defcribes the wars 
of the gods againlt the giants, a fabulous tradition of 
which he makes the earlieft mention. This defcription, 
and that of the winter in the Works and Days, may be 
compared with fome of the fineft paffages in Homer; but 
the companion cannot be long maintained in favour of 
Hefiod. The defcription of Tartarus, into which the 
Titans are precipitated by the thunder of Jupiter, offers fo 
ftriking a refemblance to the Hell of Milton, that it is 
difficult not to imagine that the one ferved as a model for 
the other. The conformity of ideas in a fubjeCt which 
the difference of religion would have appeared to render 
fo little probable, may be cited as a curious inftance of 
coincidence, to fay nothing more. 
As we omit all notice of doubtful writings, our opinion 
of 
