HYMN TO VENUS: TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH VERSE. TO THE READER OF THE ENSUING HYMN, Os the three greater hymns of Homer, viz. one to Apollo, one to Mercury, and one to Venus, this to Venus is the shortest ; it is also the most fimple in its defign, and connected in its parts. The other two abound more in digreffions both geographical and mythological, and contain many allufions to ancient cuftonis and hiftory, which, without a commentary, 1 could not well be understood by the generality of readers. These confiderations determined me to ac quiefce in the tranflation of this Hymn, though I had once entertained thoughts of turning them all three into English verse. ་ As I had often read them all with extraordinary pleasure, I could not avoid fometimes reflecting on the cenfures of fome grammarians, who have denied, or at least doubted them to be genuine. A poem which is good in itfelf cannot really lofe any thing of its value, though it should appear, upon a ftrict inquiry, not to be the work of fo eminent an author as him to whom it was firit imputed; but all N truth is fo amiable in itself, that even where it is of least importance there is a pleasure in the search after it, and a fatisfaction in the vindication of it. Tho' the beauties of this enfuing poem, in the original, want not even the name of Homer to recommend them, and much lefs does that mighty name ftand in need of their reputation, yet if they are his, it is an injuftice to him to afcribe them to any other; and it is a hardship to them to deprive them of the authority due to them, and to leave them to make their way thro' bad judgments purely by their own merit. I will not trouble the reader with the inquiry my curiofity led me to make in this matter; I will only give him one reason, of many, why these Hymns may be received for genuine. The most suspected of them all is that to Apollo. (As for this to Venus, it were almost enough to induce us to conclude it legitimate, to observe that Lucretius thought it not below him to copy from the beginning of it the beginning of his own admirable poem.). The Hymn to Apollo has been supposed to have been written by one Cynæthus of Chios, who was a famous repeater of Homer's verfes*. To obviate *After the decease of Homer, there were fuch persons who made a profeffion of repeating his verses; from the repetitions of whom, and of their defcendants or fucceffors, (for they became a sect) the entire poems of Homer, in aftertimes, were collected and put in order. These were called Homerista, or Homeride of whom fee Aelian. Var. Hift. L. 13. c. 14: Athena. L. 1. 5. 14. Strabo, L. 14. Pindar Nem, ode 2. Calius Rodig. L. 7. c. 29. which fuppofition we only reply, that this very Hynin to Apollo is quoted twice by Thucydides, in the third book of his history, and exprefsly quoted as the work of Homer. After his fecond quotation, which confiits of about half a score verses, Thucydides observes, that in those verfes Homer has made mention of himself: hence it is beyond queftion Thucydides believed, or rather was affured, it was the work of Homer. He might be very well morally affured of it, for he lived within four hundred years of Homer*, and that is no distance of time to render the knowledge of fuch things either uncertain or obfcure in fuch a country as Greece, and to a man of such learning, power, and wisdom, as our author. The learned Cafaubon, in his comment on a paffage in the first book of Strabot, takes the liberty to diffent from Strabo, and cites, as authority against him, part of the quotation made by Thucydides from the aforementioned Hymn of Homer. Strabo fays, Homer has made no mention of what country he was. In one of the verses cited by Thucydides, Homer calls himself "The blind man "of rocky Chiost." Cafaubon's note is as follows: In * Herodotus fays of himself, in Euterpe, he was but four hundred years after Homer. Thucydides was contemporary with Herodotus. + Strab. lib. I. p. 30. The original fays "The blind man who lives in "rocky or fandy Chios, and whofe poems thall be in higheft "efteem to all pofterity:" which indeed only proves that he dwelt there, not that he was born there. Hymno Apollonis quem ego cur deheamus aberev contra autoritatem Thucydidis, caufam nullam futis magnam videor in eo inquam hymno, bæc de fe Homerus, &c. Now, whether it be more reasonable, by the example of fo learned a man as Cafaubon, to give credit to the authority of Thucydides, the most grave, wife, faithful and confummate hiftorian that ever wrote, or to give into the fcruples, conje&ures, and fuggeftions of fcholiafts and grammarians, I leave to the determination of each impartial reader. SING, Mufe! the force and all-informing fire Her charms th' immortal minds of gods can move, Of all the num'rous hoft of gods above, 5 ΤΟ 19 Chariots with brafs to arm, and form the fenceful 24 |