Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 2.djvu/57

Ancient, tho' neither of them had seen the Town on Fire? For the Draughts of both were taken from the Idea's which they had of Nature. Cities have been burnt, before either of them were in being. But to close the Simile as I began it; they wou'd not have design'd it after the same manner: Apelles would have distin­guish'd Pyrrhus from the rest of all the Grecians, and shew'd him, forcing his entrance into Priam's Palace; there he had set him in the fairest light, and given him the chief place of all his Figures; because he was a Grecian, and he wou'd do Honour to his Country. Raphael, who was an Italian, and descended from the Trojans, wou'd have made Æneas the Heroe of his Piece: and perhaps not with his Father on his Back; his Son in one hand, his Bundle of Gods in the other; and his Wife fol­lowing; (for an Act of Piety is not half so graceful in a Picture as an Act of Courage:) he would have rather drawn him killing Androgeus, or some other, hand to hand; and the blaze of the Fires shou'd have darted full upon his Face, to make him conspicuous amongst his Tro­jans. 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 urg'd, that I have granted a Resemblance in some parts; yet therein Virgil has excell'd 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 Criticks shew 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 neither; he had it from the Story of Orpheus and Eurydice. But to what end did Ulysses make that Journey? Æneas undertook it by the