nor had he proceeded far in his story when somebody knocked very hard at the door. The company expressed some amazement, and Fanny and the good woman turned pale: her husband went forth, and whilst he was absent, which was some time, they all remained silent, looking at one another, and heard several voices discoursing pretty loudly. Adams was fully persuaded that spirits were abroad, and began to meditate some exorcisms; Joseph a little inclined to the same opinion; Fanny was more afraid of men; and the good woman herself began to suspect her guests, and imagined those without were rogues belonging to their gang. At length the master of the house returned, and, laughing, told Adams he had discovered his apparition; that the murderers were sheepstealers, and the twelve persons murdered were no other than twelve sheep; adding, that the shepherds had got the better of them, had secured two, and were proceeding with them to a justice of peace. This account greatly relieved the fears of the whole company; but Adams murmured to himself, He was convinced of the truth of apparitions for all that. They now sat cheerfully round the fire, till the master of the house, having surveyed his guests, and conceiving that the cassock, which having fallen down appeared under Adams's great coat, and the shabby livery on Joseph Andrews, did not well suit with the familiarity between them, began to entertain some suspicions, not much to their advantage: addressing himself therefore to Adams, he said, He perceived he was a clergyman by his dress, and supposed that honest man was his footman.'Sir,' answered Adams, 'I am a clergyman at your ser'vice; but as to that young man, whom you have rightly termed honest, he is at present in nobody's service; 'he never lived in any other family than that of Lady 'Booby, from whence he was discharged, I assure you, for เ เ 'no crime.' Joseph said, He did not wonder the gentleman was surprised to see one of Mr. Adams's character condescend to so much goodness with a poor man.เ Child,' said Adams, 'I should be ashamed of my cloth, if 'I thought a poor man, who is honest, below my notice or เ my familiarity. I know not how those who think other'wise can profess themselves followers and servants of Him 'who made no distinction, unless, peradventure, by preferring the poor to the rich.'-'Sir,' said he, addressing himself to the gentleman, 'these two poor young people are my parishioners, and I look on them and love them as my children. There is something singular enough in 'their history, but I have not now time to recount it.' The master of the house, notwithstanding the simplicity which discovered itself in Adams, knew too much of the world to give a hasty belief to professions. He was not yet quite certain that Adams had any more of the clergyman in him than his cassock. To try him therefore further, he asked him, 'If Mr. Pope had lately published any thing new?' Adams answered, He had heard great commendations of that poet, but that he had never read, nor knew, any of his works. Ho! ho!' says the gentleman to himself, 'have I caught you ?-What,' said he, 'have you never seen his Homer?' Adams answered, He had never read any translation of the classics.— 'Why truly,' replied the gentleman, 'there is a dignity ' in the Greek language, which I think no modern tongue can reach.'-' Do you understand Greek, Sir?' said Adams hastily. 'A little, Sir,' answered the gentleman. Do you know, Sir,' cried Adams, where I 'can buy an Eschylus? an unlucky misfortune lately ' happened to mine.' Eschylus was beyond the gentleman, though he knew him very well by name; he therefore, returning back to Homer, asked Adams, What part of the Iliad he thought most excellent? Adams returned, เ เ เ His question would be properer, What kind of beauty was the chief in poetry? for that Homer was equally excellent in them all. And, indeed,' continued he, 'what Cicero says of a complete orator, may well be applied to a great poet: "He ought to comprehend all ""perfections." Homer did this in the most excellent เ degree it is not without reason therefore, that the philosopher, in the twenty-second chapter of his Poetics, ' mentions him by no other appellation than that of the เ Poet. He was the father of the drama, as well as the epic: not of tragedy only, but of comedy also; for his Margites, which is deplorably lost, bore, says Aristotle, the same analogy to comedy, as his Odyssey and Iliad 'to tragedy. To him, therefore, we owe Aristophanes, as well as Euripides, Sophocles, and my poor Æschylus. 'But if you please we will confine ourselves (at least for 'the present) to the Iliad, his noblest work; though 'neither Aristotle nor Horace give it the preference, as 'I remember, to the Odyssey. First, then, as to his subject, can any thing be more simple, and at the same เ time more noble? He is rightly praised by the first of 'those judicious critics, for not choosing the whole war, 'which, though he says it hath a complete beginning and end, would have been too great for the understanding to comprehend at one view. I have therefore often wondered why so correct a writer as Horace should, in his epistle to Lillius, call him the Trojani Belli เ Scriptorem. Secondly, his action, termed by Aristotle, 'Pragmaton Systasis; is it possible for the mind of man to conceive an idea of such perfect unity, and at the same time so replete with greatness? And here I must 'observe, what I do not remember to have seen noted by any, the Harmotton, that agreement of his action to his subject; for as the subject is anger, how agreeable ' is his action, which is war; from which every incident เ เ เ arises, and to which every episode immediately relates. 'Thirdly, his manners, which Aristotle places second in his description of the several parts of tragedy, and 'which he says are included in the action; I am at a 'loss whether I should rather admire the exactness of his 'judgment in the nice distinction, or the immensity of his 'imagination in their variety. For, as to the former of 'these, how accurately is the sedate, injured resentment ' of Achilles, distinguished from the hot, insulting passion ' of Agamemnon! How widely doth the brutal courage 'of Ajax differ from the amiable bravery of Diomedes; and the wisdom of Nestor, which is the result of long ' reflexion and experience, from the cunning of Ulysses, 'the effect of art and subtlety only! If we consider their variety, we may cry out, with Aristotle in his 24th chapter, that no part of this divine poem is destitute 'of manners. Indeed, I might affirm that there is scarce a character in human nature untouched in some part or เ other. And as there is no passion which he is not ' able to describe, so is there none in his reader which 'he cannot raise. If he hath any superior excellence 'to the rest, I have been inclined to fancy it is in the pathetic. I am sure I never read with dry eyes the 'two episodes where Andromache is introduced, in the 'former lamenting the danger, and in the latter the death, of Hector. The images are so extremely tender in these, that I am convinced the poet hath the worthiest and best heart imaginable. Nor can I help observing how Sophocles falls short of the beauties of the original in that imitation of the dissuasive speech of Andromache which he hath put into the mouth of Tec" messa. And yet Sophocles was the greatest genius who ever wrote tragedy; nor have any of his successors in that art, that is to say, neither Euripides nor Seneca 'the tragedian, been able to come near him. As to his เ เ เ เ เ เ เ เ 'sentiments and diction, I need say nothing; the former are particularly remarkable for the utmost perfection 'on that head, namely, propriety; and as to the latter, 'Aristotle, whom doubtless you have read over and over, is very diffuse. I shall mention but one thing more, 'which that great critic in his division of tragedy calls Opsis, or the scenery; and which is as proper to the เ epic as to the drama, with this difference, that in the ' former it falls to the share of the poet, and in the latter 'to that of the painter. But did ever painter imagine sea, a scene like that in the 13th and 14th Iliads? where 'the reader sees at one view the prospect of Troy, with the army drawn up before it: the Grecian army, camp, and fleet; Jupiter sitting on Mount Ida, with his head เ wrapt in a cloud, and a thunderbolt in his hand, 'looking towards Thrace; Neptune driving through the which divides on each side to permit his passage, ' and then seating himself on Mount Samos: the heavens opened, and the deities all seated on their thrones. This is sublime! This is poetry!' Adams then rapt out a hundred Greek verses, and with such a voice, emphasis, and action, that he almost frightened the women; and as for the gentleman, he was so far from entertaining any further suspicion of Adams, that he now doubted whether he had not a bishop in his house. He ran into the most extravagant encomiums on his learning; and the goodness of his heart began to dilate to all the strangers. He said, he had great compassion for the poor young woman, who looked pale and faint with her journey; and in truth he conceived a much higher opinion of her quality than it deserved. He said, he was sorry he could not accommodate them all: but, if they were content with his fire-side, he would sit up with the men; and the young woman might, if she pleased, partake his wife's bed, which he advised her |