On Homer, by Alpheus of Mytilene.

Still in our ears Andromache complains,
And still in sight the fate of Troy remains;
Still Ajax fights, still Hector's dragg'd along,
Such strange enchantment dwells in Homer's song;
Whose birth could more than one poor realm adorn,
For all the world is proud that he was born.

The thought in the first part of this is natural, and depending upon the force of poesy; in the latter part it looks as if it would aim at the history of seven towns contending for the honour of Homer's birth place; but when you expect to meet with that common story, the poet slides by, and raises the whole world for a kind of arbiter, which is to end the contention amongst its several parts.

On Anacreon by Antipater.

This tomb be thine, Anacreon; all around
Let Ivy wreath, let flowrets deck the ground,
And from it's earth, enrich'd with such a prize,
Let wells of milk and streams of wine arise:
So will thine ashes yet a pleasure know,
If any pleasure reach the shades below.

The poet here written upon, is an easy gay author, and he who writes upon him has filled his own head with the character of his subject. He seems to love his theme so much, that he thinks of nothing but pleasing him as if he were still alive, by entering into his libertine spirit; so that the humour is easy and gay, resembling Anacreon in its air, raised by such images, and pointed with such a turn as he might have used. I give it a place here, because the author may have designed it for his honour; and I take an opportunity from it to advise others, that when they would praise, they cau

tiously avoid every looser qualification, and fix only where there is a real foundation in merit.

On Euripides, by Ion.

Divine Euripides, this tomb we see
So fair, is not a monument for thee,

So much as thou for it, since all will own
Thy name and lasting praise adorns the stone.

The thought here is fine, but its fault is, that it is general, that it may belong to any great man, because it points out no particular character. It would be better, if when we light upon such a turn, we join with something that circumscribes and bounds it to the qualities of our subject. He who gives his praise in gross will often appear either to have been a stranger to those he writes upon, or not to have found any thing in them which is praiseworthy.

On Sophocles, by Simonides.

Wind, gentle ever-green, to form a shade
Around the tomb where Sophocles is laid;
Sweet ivy wind thy boughs, and intertwine
With blushing roses and the clust'ring vine;
Thus will thy lasting leaves, with beauties hung,
Prove grateful emblems of the lays he sung;
Whose soul, exalted like a god of wit,
Among the Muses and the Graces writ.

This epigram I have opened more than any of the former; the thought towards the latter end seemed closer couched, so as to require an explication. I fancied the poet aimed at the picture which is generally made of Apollo and the Muses, he sitting with his harp in the middle, and they around him. This looked beautiful to my thought, and

because the image arose before me out of the words of the original as I was reading it, I ventured to explain them so.

On Menander, the author unnamed.

The very bees, O sweet Menander, hung
To taste the Muses spring upon thy tongue;
The very Graces made the scenes you writ
'Their happy point of fine expression hit.
Thus still you live, you make your Athens shine,
And raise its glory to the skies in thine.

'The epigram has a respect to the character of its subject; for Menander writ remarkably with a justness and purity of language. It has also told the country he was born in, without either a set or a hidden manner, while it twists together the glory of the poet and his nation, so as to make the nation depend upon his for an increase of its own.

'I will offer no more instances at present, to shew that they who deserve praise have it returned them from different ages. Let these which have been laid down, shew men that envy will not always prevail. And to the end that writers may more successfully enliven the endeavours of one another, let them consider, in some such manner as I have attempted, what may be the just spirit and art of praise. It is indeed very hard to come up to it. Our praise is trifling when it depends upon fable; it is false when it depends upon wrong qualifications; it means nothing when it is general; it is extremely difficult to hit when we propose to raise characters high, while we keep to them justly. I shall end this with transcribing that excellent epitaph of Mr. Cowley, wherein, with a kind of grave and philosophic humour, he very beautifully speaks of himself (withdrawn from the world, and dead to all the interests of it) as of a man really deceased. At the same time

it is an instruction how to leave the public with a

good grace.

Epitaphium vivi Authoris.

Hic, O viator, sub lare parvulo
Couleius hic est conditus, hic jacet
Defunctus humani laboris
Sorte, supervacuaque vita:
Non indecora pauperie nitens,
Et non inerti nobilis otio,
Vanoque dilectis popello
Divitiis animosus hostis.
Possis ut illum dicere mortuum,
En terra jam nunc quantula sufficit !
Exempta sit curis, viator,

Terra sit illa levis, precare.
Hic sparge flores, sparge breves rosas,
Nam vita gaudet mortua floribus,

Herbisque odoratis corona
Vatis adhuc cinerem calentem.

The living author's epitaph.

From life's superfluous cares enlarg'd,
His debt of human toil discharg'd,
Here Cowley lies, beneath this shed,
To ev'ry worldly int'rest dead:
With decent poverty content;
His hours of ease not idly spent ;
To fortune's goods a foe profess'd,
And hating wealth, by all caress'd.
'Tis sure, he's dead; for lo! how small
A spot of earth is now his all!

O! wish that earth may lightly lay,

And ev'ry care be far away!

Bring flow'rs, the short-liv'd roses bring,

To life deceas'd fit offering!

And sweets around the poet strow,

Whilst yet with life his ashes glow.

The publication of these criticisms having procured me the following letter from a very ingenious

gentleman, I cannot forbear inserting it in the vo lume, though it did not come soon enough to have a place in any of my single papers.

MR. SPECTATOR,

• HAVING read over in your paper, No. five hundred and fifty one, some of the epigrams made by the Grecian wits, in commendation of their celebrated poets, I could not forbear sending you another, out of the same collection; which I take to be as great a compliment to Homer, as any that has yet been paid him.

Τίς ποθ ̓ ὁτὸν Τροίης πόλεμον, &c.

Who first transcrib'd the famous Trojan war,
And wise Ulysses' acts, O Jove, make known:
For since 'tis certain, thine those poems are,
No more let Homer boast they are his own.

'If you think it worthy of a place in your speculations, for ought I know (by that means) it may in time be printed as often in English, as it has already been in Greek. I am (like the rest of the world),

4th Dec.

• Sir,

'Your great admirer,

'G. R.'

The reader may observe that the beauty of this epigram is different from that of any in the foregoing. An irony is looked upon as the finest palliative of praise; and very often conveys the noblest panegyric under the appearance of satire. Homer is here seemingly accused and treated as a plagiary, but what is drawn up in the form of an accusation is certainly, as my correspondent observes, the greatest compliment that could have been paid to that divine poet.