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HOMES. THE EPIC POETS. 75the age of Homer. The important fact is, that we possessthem. Whatever hypothesis we may adopt on their originand formation, their influence on the Grecian nation and onposterity remains the same. And these are the topics whichclaim our regard.It was Homer who formed the character of the Greeknation. No poet has ever, as a poet, exercised a similar influence over his countrymen. Prophets, lawgivers, andsages have formed the character of other nations it was;reserved to a poet to form that of the Greeks. This is a traitin their character, which could not be wholly erased even inWhen lawgivers and sagesthe period of their degeneracy.appeared in Greece, the work of the poet bad already beenaccomplished and; they paid homageto his superior genius.He held up before his nation the mirror, in which theywere to behold the world of gods and heroes no less than offeeble mortals, and to behold them reflected with purity andtruth. His poems are founded on the first feelings of human nature ;on the love of children, wife, and country ;onthat passion which outweighs all others, the love of glory.His songs were poured forth from a breast, which sympathized with all the feelings of man ;and therefore theyenter, and will continue to enter, every breast, which cherishes the same sympathies. If it is granted to his immortalspirit,from another heaven than any of which he dreamedon earth, to look down on his race, to see the nations fromthe fields of Asia to the forests of Hercynia, performingpilgrimages to the fountain, which his magic wand causedto flow ;if it is permitted him to overlook the whole harvestof grand, of elevated, of glorious productions, which havebeen called into being by means of his songs wherever his;immortal spirit may reside, nothing more can be required tocomplete his happiness.Wherever writingis known, where it is used for the purpose of preserving poems, and thus a poeticliterature isformed, the muse loses her youthful freshness. Works ofthe greatest merit may still be produced j but poetryexertsits full influence only so long as it is considered inseparablefrom recitation. The Homeric poems were therefore so forfrom having produced a less considerable effect, becausethey for a long time were not written down, that the source