birth, which, though it differs in circumftance, from what has been here delivered, yet carries on the fame air, and regards the fame traditions. There is a fhort life of Homer attributed to Plutarch, wherein a third part of Ariftotle on poetry, which is now lost, is quoted for an account of his uncommon birth in this manner. "At the time when Neleus, the son of

Codrus, led the colony which was fent into Ionia, "there was in the island of Io a young girl, compref"fed by a genius, who delighted to affociate with "the Mufes, and fhare in their conforts. She, find

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ing herself with child, and being touched with the "fhame of what had happened to her, removed from "thence to a place called Egina. There he was ta"ken in an excurfion made by robbers, and being brought to Smyrna, which was then under the Ly"dians, they give her to Mæon the king, who married her upon account of her beauty. But while "the walked on the bank of the river Meles, fhe brought forth Homer, and expired. The infant was taken by Mæon, and bred up as his fon, till "the death of that prince." And from this point of the ftory the poet is let down into his traditional poverty. Here we fee, though he be taken out of the lineage of Meles, where we met him before, he has ftill as wonderful a rife invented for him; he is ftill to fpring from a demi-god, one who was of a poetical difpofition, from whom he might inherit a foul turned to poetry, and received an affiftance of heavenly infpiration.

In this life the most general tradition concerning him is his blindness; yet there are fome who will not allow even this to have happened after the manner in which it falls upon other men: chance and sickness are excluded; nothing lefs than gods and heroes must be visibly concerned about him. Thus we find among the different accounts which * Hermias has collected concerning his blindnefs, that when Homer refolved to write of Achilles, he had an exceeding defire to fill his mind with a juft idea of fo glorious a hero: wherefore, having paid all due honours at his tomb, *Hermias in Phæd. Plat, Leo Allat. de Patr, Hom, c. 10.

he

he intreats that he may obtain a fight of him. The hero grants his poet's petition, and rifes in a glorious fuit of armour, which caft fo unfufferable a fplendor, that Homer loft his eyes, while he gazed for the inlargement of his notions.

If this be any thing more than a mere fable, one would be apt to imagine it infinuated his contracting a blindness by too intense an application while he wrote his Iliad. But it is a very pompous way of letting us into the knowledge of fo fhort a truth: it looks as if men imagined the lives of poets fhould be poetically written; that to speak plainly of them, were to speak contemptibly; or that we debafe them, when they are placed in lefs glorious company than those exalted fpirits which they themselves have been fond to celebrate. We may however in fome measure be reconciled to this laft idle fable, for having occafioned fo beautiful an episode in the Ambra of Politian. That which does not inform us in a history, may please us in its proper fphere of poetry.

II. Such ftories as thefe have been

II.

the effects of a fuperftitious fondness, Stories of Hoand of the astonishment of men at what mer proceeding they confider in a view of perfection. from envy. But neither have all the fame taste, nor

do they equally fubmit to the fuperiority of others, nor bear that human nature, which they know to be imperfect, fhould be praised in an extreme without oppofition. From fome principles of this kind have arisen a fecond fort of stories, which glance at Homer with malignant fuppofitions, and endeavour to throw a diminishing air over his life, as a kind of answer to those who fought to aggrandize him injudiciously.

Under this head we may reckon those ungrounded conjectures with which his adverfaries afperfe the very defign and profecution of his travels, when they infinuate, that they were one continued fearch after authors who had written before him, and particularly upon the fame fubject, in order to deftroy them, or to rob them of their inventions.

Thus we read in * Diodorus Siculus, "That there

* Diod. Sic. 1. 4.

་་ was

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was one Daphne the daughter of Tirefias, who from "her infpirations obtained the title of a Sibyl. She "had a very extraordinary genius, and being made prieftefs at Delphos, wrote oracles with wonderful. elegance, which Homer fought for, and adorned "his poems with feveral of her verfes." But the is placed fo far in the fabulous age of the world, that nothing can be averred of her and as for the verfes now afcribed to the Sibyls, they are more modern than to be able to confirm the ftory; which, as it is univerfally affented to, difcovers that whatever there is in them in common with Homer, the compilers have rather taken from him; perhaps to strengthen the authority of their work by the protection of this tradition.

The next infinuation we hear is from Suidas, that Palamedes, who fought at Troy, was famous for poetry, and wrote concerning that war in the Doric letter which he invented, probably much against Agamemnon and Ulyffes, his mortal enemies. Upon this account some have fancied his works were fuppreffed by Agamemnon's pofterity, or that their intire deftruction was contrived and effected by Homer when he undertook the fame fubject. But furely the works of fo confiderable a man, when they had been able to bear up fo long a time as that which paffed between the fiege of Troy, and the flourishing of Homer, must have been too much difperfed, for one of fo mean a condition as he is represented, to have deftroyed in every place, though he had been never so much affifted by the vigilant temper of envy. And we may fay too, that what might have been capable of railing this principle in him, must be capable of being in fome meafure esteemed by others, and of having at least one line of it preserved to us as his.

After him, in the order of time, we meet with a whole fet of names, to whom the malignants of Homer would have him obliged, without being able to prove their affertion. Suidas mentions Corinnus Ilienfis, the fecretary of Palamedes, who writ a poem upon the fame fubject, but no one is produced as having feen it. *Tzetzes mentions (and from Johannes Melala only,)

* Tzetzes Chil. 5 Hift, 29.

Sifyphus

Sifyphus the Coan, fecretary of Teucer, but it is not fo much as known if he writ verse or profe. Besides thefe, are Dictys the Cretan, fecretary to Idomeneus, and Dares the Phrygian, an attendant of Hector, who have fpurious treatifes paffing under their names. From each of thefe is Homer faid to have borrowed his whole argument; fo inconfiftent are these stories with one another !

The next names we find, are Demodocus, whom Homer might have met at Corcyra, and Phemius, whom he might have met at Ithaca: the one (as * Plutarch fays) having according to tradition written the war of Troy, the other the return of the Grecian captain. But thefe are only two names of friends, which he is pleafed to honour with eternity in his poem, or two different pictures of himself, as author of the Iliad and Odyffes, or entirely the children of his imagination, without any particular allufion. So that his ufage here puts me in mind of his own Vulcan in the + Iliad: t The God had caft two statues, which he endued with the power of motion; and it is faid prefently after, that he is fcarce able to go unless they fupport him.

It is reported by fome, fays ‡ Ptolemæus Ephæftio, "That there was, before Homer, a woman of Mem"phis, called Phantafia, who writ of the wars of

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Troy, and the wanderings of Ulyffes. Now Homer arriving at Memphis where the had laid up her "works, and getting acquainted with Phanitas, whose "business it was to copy the facred writings, he ob

tained a fight of thefe, and followed entirely the "fcheme the had drawn." But this is a wild story, which fpeaks of an Egyptian woman with a Greek name, and who never was heard of but upon this account. It appears indeed from his knowledge of the Egyptian learning, that he was initiated into their myfteries, and for aught we know by one Phanitas. But if we confider what the name of the woman fignifies, it seems only as if from being used in a figurative expreffion, it had been mistaken afterwards for a pro

*Plutarch on Mufic.

+ Iliad 18. Ptol. Ep. Excerpt. apud Photium, 1. 5.

per

per name. And then the meaning will be, that having gathered as much information concerning the Grecian and Trojan ftory, as he could be furnished with from the accounts of Egypt, which were generally mixed with fancy and fable, he wrought out his plans of the Iliad and the Odysses.

We pafs all thefe ftories, together with the little Ili ad of Siagrus, mentioned by * Elian But one can> not leave this fubject without reflecting on the depreciating humour, and odd industry of man, which thews itfelf in raifing fuch a number of infinuations that clash with each other, and in fpiriting up fuch a croud of unwarranted names to fupport them. Nor can we but admire at the contradictory nature of this proceeding; that names of works, which either never were in being, or never worthy to live, thould be produced only to perfuade us that the most lasting and beautiful poem of the ancients was taken out of them. A beggar might be content to patch up a garment with such threds as the world throws away, but it is never to be imagined an emperor would make his robes of them.

After Homer had spent a confiderable time in travel, we find him towards his age introduced to fuch an action as tends to his difparagement. It is not enough to accufe him for fpoiling the dead, they raife a living author, by whom he must be baffled in that qualification on which his fame is founded.

There is in † Hefiod an account of an ancient poetical contention at the funeral of Amphidamus, in which, he fays, he obtained the prize, but does not mention from whom he carried it. There is also among the

Hymns afcribed to Homer, a prayer to Venus for fuccefs in a poetical difpute, but it neither mentions where, nor against whom. But though they have neglected to name their antagonists, others have fince taken care to fill up the ftories by putting them together. The making two fuch confiderable names in poetry engage, carries an amufing pomp in it, like making two heroes of the first rank enter the lifts of

Ælian. 1. 14. c. 27.

V. 272. etc.

+ Hefied. Op. et dierum, 1. 2. Hom. Hymn. 2. ad Venerem.

combat