The Iliad of Homer - Get a Free Blog

or to the received rules of composition,
as well as those which have received a
sanction from the authority of our best
poets, and are become familiar through
their use of them; such as "the cloudcompelling
Jove," &c. As for the rest,
whenever any can be as fully and significantly
expressed in a single word as in a
compounded one, the course to be taken
is obvious.
Some that cannot be so turned, as to preserve
their full image by one or two
words, may have justice done them by
circumlocution; as the epithet einosiphyllos
to a mountain, would appear little or
ridiculous translated literally "leaf-shaking,"
but affords a majestic idea in the
periphrasis: "the lofty mountain shakes
his waving woods." Others that admit of
different significations, may receive an
advantage from a judicious variation, according
to the occasions on which they