if it is permitted to him to view the vast assemblage of grand, of

elevated, of glorious productions, which had been called into

being by means of his songs; wherever his immortal spirit may

reside, this alone would suffice to complete his happiness."(35)

Can we contemplate that ancient monument, on which the "Apotheosis of

Homer"(36) is depictured, and not feel how much of pleasing association,

how much that appeals most forcibly and most distinctly to our minds, is

lost by the admittance of any theory but our old tradition? The more we

read, and the more we think--think as becomes the readers of Homer,--the

more rooted becomes the conviction that the Father of Poetry gave us this

rich inheritance, whole and entire. Whatever were the means of its

preservation, let us rather be thankful for the treasury of taste and

eloquence thus laid open to our use, than seek to make it a mere centre

around which to drive a series of theories, whose wildness is only

equalled by their inconsistency with each other.

As the hymns, and some other poems usually ascribed to Homer, are not

included in Pope's translation, I will content myself with a brief account

of the Battle of the Frogs and Mice, from the pen of a writer who has done

it full justice(37):--

This poem," says Coleridge, "is a short mock-heroic of ancient

date. The text varies in different editions, and is obviously

The Iliad of Homer