and a relish of the marvellous, to be wholly in your fentiments. Poffibly I may be fo happy as to attain both in good time: I fancy at least there is a clofe connection between them, and I fhall not despair of obtaining the one, if I can by any means. arrive at the other. But which must I endeavor at firft? Shall I prepare for the myftic by commencing with the romance, or would you advise me to begin with Malbranch before I undertake Clelia? Suffer me, however, ere I enter the regions of fiction, to bear teftimony to one conftant truth, by affuring you that I am, &c. LETTER To EUPHRONIUS. XX. October 10, 1742. I to you HAVE often mentioned to you the plea fure I received from Mr. Pope's tranflation of the Iliad: but my admiration of that inimitable performance has increased upon me, fince you tempted me to compare the copy with the original. To fay of this noble work, that it is the best which ever appeared of the kind, would be speaking in much lower terms than it deserves ; the world perhaps fcarce ever before saw a truly poetical tranflation: for, as Denham obferves, Such is our pride, our folly, or our fate, | That few, but those who cannot write, translate. Mr. Pope feems, in moft places, to have been infpired with the fame fublime fpirit that animates his original; as he often takes fire from a fingle hint in his author, and blazes out even with a stronger and brighter flame of poetry. Thus the character of Therfites, as it ftands in the English Iliad, is heightened, I think, with more masterly ftrokes of fatire than appear in the Greek; as many of those fimilies in Homer, which would appear, perhaps, to a modern eye too naked and unornamented, are painted by Pope in all the beautiful drapery of the moft graceful metaphor. With what propriety of figure, for instance, has he raised the following comparison : Ευτ' ορεος κορυφησί Νότος κατέχευεν ομίχλην, Ποιμέσιν ότι φίλην, κλεπτη δε τε νυκτός αμείνω, Τούσον τις τ' επιλεύσει όσον τ' επι λαα, νησιν. G 2 Ως Ως άρα των υπο ποσι κονίσσαλος ωρνυτ' αελλη Thus from his flaggy wings when Eurus sheds While Scarce the fwains their feeding flocks Survey, Loft and confus'd amidst the thicken'd day: So wrapt in gath'ring duft the Grecian train, A moving cloud, fwept on and hid the plain. WHEN Mars, being wounded by Diomed, flies back to heaven, Homer compares him in his paffage to a dark cloud raised by fummer heats, and driven by the wind. Οι δ' εκ νεφέων ερεβεννε φαίνεται αήρ, Il. v. 864. The inimitable tranflator improves this image, by throwing in fome circunftances, which, tho' not in the original, are exactly in the spirit of Homer: As vapors, blown by Aufter's fultry breath, Pregnant with plagues, and shedding feeds of death, Beneath Beneath the rage of burning Sirius rise, Choak the parch'd earth, and blacken all the skies; In fuch a cloud the god, from combat driv'n, High o'er the dufty whirlwind fcales the heav'n. THERE is a defcription in the eighth book, which Euftathius, it feems, efteemed the moft beautiful night-piece that could be found in poetry. If I am not greatly mistaken, however, I can produce a finer: and I am perfuaded even the warmeft admirer of Homer will allow, the following lines are inferior to the correfponding ones in the tranflation; Ως δ' ότ' ἐν κρανῳ αερα φαεινην αμφι σελέντην Φαίνετ' αριπρεπέα, ότε τ' έπλετο νηνεμος αιθήρ, Εκ τ' έβαναν πασαι σκοπιαι και πρωινές ακροι, Και ναπαι· ερανόθεν δ' άρ' υπερράγη ασπετα αιθήρ, Παντα δε τ' ειδεται αέρα, γεγηθε δε τε φρένα Il. viii. 551. ποιμην. As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night, O'er beavn's clear azure fpreads her facred light ; When not a breath disturbs the deep ferene, And not a cloud o'ercafts the folemn fcene, G 3 Around Around her throne the vivid planets roll, I FEAR the enthusiastic admirers of Homer would look upon me with much indignation, were they to hear me fpeak of any thing in modern language as equal to the ftrength and majefty of that great father of poetry. But the following paffage having been quoted by a celebrated author of antiquity, as an inftance of the true Sublime, I will leave it to you to determine whether the tranflation has not at least as juft a claim to that character as the original. Ως δ' ότε χείμαρροι ποταμοί κατ' ορέσφι ρέοντες Ες λίσγαίκειαν συμβάλλετον οβριμον ύδωρ, Κρόνων ἐκ μεγάλων, κοίλης εντοθε χαράδρης, Των δε τε τήλισε δέπον εν δρεσιν εκλύε ποιμίω. Ως των μισγομένων γενεται ιάχη τε φόβος τε As torrents roll, increas'd by num'rous rills, With rage impetuous down their echoing bills, Rusk |