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TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE

To the Reader.

If the persons who endeavour to rescue from oblivion neglected merit confessedly attempt a meritorious task, the translators of those ancient writers, who have hitherto failed of obtaining the circulation and celebrity justly due to their learning and genius, are fairly entitled, at all events, to the praise of good intention. Should these adventurers prove so fortunate as to acquit themselves, in their respective undertakings, to the satisfaction of the public, they are further entitled to the regard and encouragement which ought to recompense, but do not uniformly attend, patient and judicious labour, directed to the advancement of taste and science.

The poem of Apollonius Rhodius, now offered to the public in an entirely new version, appeared to the present translator a fair object for such a chivalrous enterprise. At least, the partial admiration and gratitude of one, who had frequently perused, and always with increasing pleasure, this delightful poet, considered his present reputation and rank among the illustrious writers of antiquity as totally inadequate to his intrinsic merits. Apollonius Rhodius, it is true, can by no means be considered as a writer unknown or obscure; VOL. I,

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yet has he failed of obtaining his just station on the heights of Parnassus. He is chiefly known to professed scholars, and is little in the hands of the modern reader, whose commerce with the ancients is carried on through the medium of translation. Indeed, even when he is remembered among the learned, he is usually introduced in the degrading attitude of a captive, bound to the chariot and following the triumphal pomp of Virgil, who has literally fulfilled, in the person of this poet, his own prediction in the third Georgic,

Aonio rediens deducam vertice musas.

Thus is the name of Apollonius lost, and absorbed in that of his conqueror. His poetical beauties are all hung up as trophies to decorate the shrine of Virgil. His primary and original claims on our attention, in his own right, are forgotten; and he is honoured only with the derivative and subordinate praise, of having supplied to the Mantuan bard the crude materials and unformed elements from whence some of his beauties have been wrought and fashioned. Thus is he chiefly known to the world, by the vague reputation, the traditional merit, generally taken on trust, that his Loves of Medea and Jason are the groundwork on which Virgil has formed the fourth book of his Æneid. But how small a part is that of the poem! with what happy passages, what various and striking beauties, does it every where abound! The fact is, that the bard of Alexandria has been worse treated, considering his just pretensions and real merits, than any poet of antiquity; and furnishes a striking instance of the caprice of for

tune, and the uncertainty even of literary posthumous reputation. No critic, ancient or modern, has been found to do full justice to the charms of his versification, the beauty of his diction, the apposite illustration of his similes, his picturesque and luminous display of moral and physical nature, his knowledge of the human heart, the sportive graces of his fancy, and those golden visions of bold and excursive imagination, worthy of the fairest names among the Italian poets. No critic has been found, to ascertain with accuracy the obligations of Virgil to this poet.

It is a curious circumstance, to inquire how this has happened. Two Roman writers, of great eminence, have condescended to avail themselves of the talents and the labours of the Alexandrian : yet they have not, in any part of their works, acknowledged the obligation, or paid the smallest tribute of gratitude to his memory. May it not be conjectured, that the poets in question, and their adherents, found an ungenerous interest in the keeping back from view the merits of a rival, whose prominence might tend to overshadow them?-May not the Romans, from a general sentiment of pride and triumph in their great epic poet, have been disposed to consign, if possible, to obscurity, the source from whence he had imbibed his very genius and poetical style and character, and had drawn so many of his softest and purest graces?—The father of epic song rose too powerful and vast for such an attempt. The obligations which Virgil owed to Homer could not be dissembled or concealed, because the poems of Homer were in every hand. But they judged rightly (as the event has shown), that it might be

possible to exclude Apollonius, a writer of inferior note, as an unwelcome visitant, an upbraiding creditor, whose presence would remind the great master of Roman poetry, how much he was indebted to borrowed stores. On him, the partial criticism of Rome might hope to exercise its injustice with impunity.

Certain it is, that two of the great critics of antiquity (from whose sentence there could lie no appeal, were it pronounced on a fair hearing and full deliberation), have treated the Rhodian poet in a manner that seems to justify the coldness and neglect which he has now experienced from succeeding ages. But may not these respectable and amiable writers, Quintilian and Longinus, of whose exquisite taste and sound judgment no doubt can be entertained; may they not, in this instance, have been borne away by fashion?-May they not have yielded, in some measure, to the prejudices of the times; and neglected Apollonius, because they found him neglected by others? May they not have hastily taken his character on trust; and adopted the opinion of his mediocrity, without a diligent perusal of his writings? May they not, through excessive admiration of Homer, have wished to decry the founder of a new school?

It is to be remembered, that the critics whom I have mentioned were enthusiastic admirers (as, indeed, who among the ancients was not?) of the poems of Homer. To him they referred, as to the standard of excellence. From his works, in their opinion, all the rules of good writing were to be drawn. Bold, and perhaps unfortunate, at the same time, was the poet, who, in such a disposition of the literary world, ventured to deviate from the