The Iliad of Homer - Get a Free Blog

on some imperfection; and it is often
hard to distinguish exactly where the virtue
ends, or the fault begins. As prudence
may sometimes sink to suspicion, so may
a great judgment decline to coldness; and
as magnanimity may run up to profusion
or extravagance, so may a great invention
to redundancy or wildness. If we look
upon Homer in this view, we shall perceive
the chief objections against him to
proceed from so noble a cause as the excess
of this faculty.
Among these we may reckon some of his
marvellous fictions, upon which so much
criticism has been spent, as surpassing
all the bounds of probability. Perhaps it
may be with great and superior souls,
as with gigantic bodies, which, exerting
themselves with unusual strength, exceed
what is commonly thought the due proportion
of parts, to become miracles in
the whole; and, like the old heroes of that