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Article SKETCHES OF FOREIGN LITERATURE. ← Page 2 of 3 →
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Sketches Of Foreign Literature.
calculation , or a metaphysical description of the real and relative faults of those on whom he passed a judgment which has been adopted by ail ages and nations . It was by the impression they made on die reader , that great critic defined them ; and the public always conformed to his opinion . Du Bois . POETIC COMPOSITION .
HISTORY sets to view the revolutions in human affairs , in which we behold real manners , virtues , and vices , with talents often in themselves middling and indifferent . Simple history is a narration , timid in the presence of truth ; a recital of facts expressed in the plainest manner : it fears nothing so much as the pomp of words . The epopceia , on the other hand , seizes the pencil of
Homer , and at one view takes in the whole universe . A god discovers to the poet , in one instance , heaven , hell , and earth ; the past , the present and the future ; who chooses at will , and draws up a history of mankind , rather than of men . The ethic ascends even to the mysteries of divine providence , and shews us at once their moving forces , their direction , and the effects they have produced .
Here every thing shall he uttered with a degree of nobleness and dignity , superior to its natural condition ; men should speak in the style of heroes , the passions should all have an energy , a continued vigour ; in short : all should be nature , but nature enchanted and transported by the enthusiastic raptures of the Muse . There is not a single verse in the / Eneid which does not partake of the di
gnity ofthe Muse , invoked by the poet in the beginning of his work " and to this dignity they owe their poetic strain ; without this , they might be verses indeed in another species of writing , but they would be prose in the epopceia . BATTEUX .
STRICTURES on the ILIAD . , THOSE who are fond of father Bossu ' s system , will not pardon me , if 1 do not find . out the particular moral which Homer has inculcated in his Iliad : I can by no means think , with that author , that an epic writer first of all pitches upon a certain moral , as the ground-work and foundation of his poem , and afterwards forms a
story to it ; yet , as . 1 am of opinion , that no poem ever was , or can be made , from which some great moral may not be deduced , I shall briefl y consider the maxims which occur upon a perusal ofthe Iliad . The first is , that super-intending Divinity presides over all , and acts in all ; and that nothing is done without it ; this seems to be the principal moral which Homer had in viewThe second is
. , that those who implore Heaven for vengeance , have frequently reason to lament the success of their prayers ; this arises from the action . When 1 consider the behaviour of Agamemnon , and the consequences with which it is attended , I am ready to confess that we should not irritate those of whose assistance we may stand
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Sketches Of Foreign Literature.
calculation , or a metaphysical description of the real and relative faults of those on whom he passed a judgment which has been adopted by ail ages and nations . It was by the impression they made on die reader , that great critic defined them ; and the public always conformed to his opinion . Du Bois . POETIC COMPOSITION .
HISTORY sets to view the revolutions in human affairs , in which we behold real manners , virtues , and vices , with talents often in themselves middling and indifferent . Simple history is a narration , timid in the presence of truth ; a recital of facts expressed in the plainest manner : it fears nothing so much as the pomp of words . The epopceia , on the other hand , seizes the pencil of
Homer , and at one view takes in the whole universe . A god discovers to the poet , in one instance , heaven , hell , and earth ; the past , the present and the future ; who chooses at will , and draws up a history of mankind , rather than of men . The ethic ascends even to the mysteries of divine providence , and shews us at once their moving forces , their direction , and the effects they have produced .
Here every thing shall he uttered with a degree of nobleness and dignity , superior to its natural condition ; men should speak in the style of heroes , the passions should all have an energy , a continued vigour ; in short : all should be nature , but nature enchanted and transported by the enthusiastic raptures of the Muse . There is not a single verse in the / Eneid which does not partake of the di
gnity ofthe Muse , invoked by the poet in the beginning of his work " and to this dignity they owe their poetic strain ; without this , they might be verses indeed in another species of writing , but they would be prose in the epopceia . BATTEUX .
STRICTURES on the ILIAD . , THOSE who are fond of father Bossu ' s system , will not pardon me , if 1 do not find . out the particular moral which Homer has inculcated in his Iliad : I can by no means think , with that author , that an epic writer first of all pitches upon a certain moral , as the ground-work and foundation of his poem , and afterwards forms a
story to it ; yet , as . 1 am of opinion , that no poem ever was , or can be made , from which some great moral may not be deduced , I shall briefl y consider the maxims which occur upon a perusal ofthe Iliad . The first is , that super-intending Divinity presides over all , and acts in all ; and that nothing is done without it ; this seems to be the principal moral which Homer had in viewThe second is
. , that those who implore Heaven for vengeance , have frequently reason to lament the success of their prayers ; this arises from the action . When 1 consider the behaviour of Agamemnon , and the consequences with which it is attended , I am ready to confess that we should not irritate those of whose assistance we may stand