The Iliad of Homer - Get a Free Blog

the sound of his line to a beautiful agreement
with its sense. If the Grecian poet
has not been so frequently celebrated on
this account as the Roman, the only reason
is, that fewer critics have understood
one language than the other. Dionysius
of Halicarnassus has pointed out many
of our author's beauties in this kind, in
his treatise of the Composition of Words.
It suffices at present to observe of his
numbers, that they flow with so much
ease, as to make one imagine Homer had
no other care than to transcribe as fast
as the Muses dictated, and, at the same
time, with so much force and inspiriting
vigour, that they awaken and raise us like
the sound of a trumpet. They roll along
as a plentiful river, always in motion, and
always full; while we are borne away by
a tide of verse, the most rapid, and yet the
most smooth imaginable.