This, I think, is a just
comparison betwixt the two poets in the conduct of their several
designs. Virgil cannot be said to copy Homer; the Grecian had only
the advantage of writing first. If it be urged that I have granted
a resemblance in some parts, yet therein Virgil has excelled him;
for what are the tears of Calypso for being left, to the fury and
death of Dido? Where is there the whole process of her passion and
all its violent effects to be found in the languishing episode of
the "Odysses"? If this be to copy, let the critics show us the same
disposition, features, or colouring in their original. The like may
be said of the descent to hell, which was not of Homer's invention
either; he had it from the story of Orpheus and Eurydice. But to
what end did Ulysses make that journey? AEneas undertook it by the
express commandment of his father's ghost. There he was to show him
all the succeeding heroes of his race, and next to Romulus (mark, if
you please the address of Virgil) his own patron, Augustus Caesar.
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