1808.] 
stance of the ‘glorious uncertainty’ of cri- 1 
“‘ They are both in the wrong,” judges. 
ticism. 
says Cooke,* “ for had they considered 
throngh how many hands the Iliad and 
Odyssey have been since they came ~ 
from their first author, they would not 
have pretended to determine the ques- 
tion who was first, by their style.” It is 
universally believed, however, that he 
lived some little time before, or was at 
least contemporary with Homer, though 
the better opinion seems to be, that he 
was somewhat older. Pope, after all the 
authorities he could. find for Homer, fixes 
his decision on the Arundel Marble. To 
enter into all the disputes which this un- 
certainty has occasioned, would be as 
endless as it is unnecessary ; but we may 
venture to place Hesiod about a thou- 
sand years before Christ, without per- 
haps exceeding one hundred on either 
side. 
The events of Hesiod’s life were few | 
and unimportant, if they were confined 
to the trifling details which have come to 
our knowledge. In thelittle we know, 
we have no other authority than some 
passages in his works. That he tended 
his own flocks on Mount Helicon, and 
there received’ his first inspirations of 
poetry, 1s supposed from the beginning 
of his ‘'‘Theogony.’ 
Al ww ood “Hetodey warty eidukay doidny 
“Ages arospecivovd’ “Enucaiveg vad Cactéou. 
The whole of this passage, which ex- 
tends to thirteen lines, has been consi- 
dered by some as an allegory, intending 
to intimate that Hesiod, sleeping one day 
as he describes, happened tr dream that 
nine young maids came and fed him with 
laurel-berries. In that early and super- 
stitiuus age, it was believed that he had 
been particularly chosen by heaven, to 
be a poet. He accordingly forsook the 
humble occupation of a shepherd, and 
‘applied himself wholly to learning and 
the arts. But it was perhaps no other 
than a poetical flight, into which his va- 
nity betrayed him, and for which he has 
been deservedly ridiculed by Lucian,t in 9 
one of his Dialogues. Ovid, no doubt, 
considered it in the same light when he 
said, in his Art of Love, 
Nec mihi sunt vis Clio, Clifsque Sorores, 
\ Servanti pectdes valiibus, Ascra, tuis. 
ft would appear from the first book of 
“Works and Days,’ that the father 
d left some effects behind him ; 
ision of which his brother 
ny NO. 168, 
Lyceum of Ancient Literature—Hesiod. 
121 
Perses defrauded him by bribing the 
"Hon MEV yae MAnpoV EacoAKEDs CAAR TE DTOAAM 
‘agracuy epseeis, prey nudaivony Raciriac: fe 
“eh 1, 37. 
He was so far from being provoked to . 
any resentment by this injustice, that he 
expresses.a concern for those who place 
their happiness in riches only, at the 
expence of virtue. He informs us at the 
same time, that he was not only above 
want, but that he was enabled to assist 
his brother upon many occasions, which 
he continued to do, even after the ill. 
usage he had received from him. 
Tt may be almost superfiuous to men- 
tion the story of his poetical contest with 
Homer, which even Plutarch reckons 
among the "“Ewra mpéyyale of ancient 
times. ‘The contest is said to have oc- 
curred at the funeral of Amphidamas, 
king of Eubcea, for the prize in poetry, 
which #esiod won; and receiving a Tri- 
pod as an emblem of his victory, he de- 
dicated it to the Muses, with an inscrip- 
tion, But this account has generally 
been rejected as fable; and the same 
may be said of the tale of the two poets 
having sung together in Delos, in ho- 
nour of Apollo, which has been strenu- 
ously denied by those who appear, on the 
best authority, to place Hesiod thirty or 
forty years before Homer. It is besides 
in direct contradiction to the assertion of 
Hesiod himself, who positively declares 
that he never undertook any voyage, but 
that to Chalcis in Euboea. These ane 
ecdotes had, however,.at one time suf 
ficient currency to indace Dion*,Varrof, 
and Philostratusf, to consider Homer 
and Hesiod as contemporaries. Lucian§ 
has also included these imaginary trials of 
skill in his account of the several con- 
tentions in every art which he supposes 
to have passed at a famous festival in the 
Isle of Herres.|| In the latter part of 
*® Dion Chrysost. p. 20. 
+ Aut. Gell. Lib. ii. cap. 11. 
~ 4) In Heroic, in Euphorb. 
+ § P. 399. 
|| Robinson, (Dissert. de Hes. edit. Loes= 
ner, p. 52, 33,} seems to think that the story 
of the contest may be credited so far, as that 
Hesiod gained a victory, but not over Homer. 
With xespect to the meeting of the two 
poets at Delos, Barnes (Pratlog. in Luesner.) 
reluctantly withholds his credit. Robinson 
(uti supra 34,) more decidedly considers it as 
a fiction of yrammarians. The two Epigrams 
on the subject, (mentioned in Lib. Anthol. 
Dion Chrys. and Eustathius, ad Il. p. 5) 
have been long since rejected, 
R | Hesiod’s 
