The Iliad of Homer - Get a Free Blog

258.
sporting dolphins, the fugitive
fishes, and the fisherman on
the shore with his casting net,
are minutely represented. As to
the Hesiodic images themselves,
the leading remark is,
that they catch at beauty by ornament,
and at sublimity by
exaggeration; and upon the untenable
supposition of the
genuineness of this poem,
there is this curious peculiarity,
that, in the description of
scenes of rustic peace, the superiority
of Homer is decisive—while
in those of war and
tumult it may be thought, perhaps,
that the Hesiodic poet
has more than once the advantage."
"This legend is one of the most
pregnant and characteristic in