Page:George Chapman, a critical essay (IA georgechapmancri00swin).pdf/154

 spirit; and if, as he says of Homer, not without evident and immediate reference to his own lot, 'like a man verecundi ingenii (which he witnesseth of himself), he lived unhonoured and needy till his death,' we may believe that he did not live dissatisfied or dejected. Unworthy indeed would the workman have been of his own work if from the contemplation of it he had been too poor in spirit or too covetous of reward to draw the consolation of a high content.

This strong and sovereign solace against all the evils that can beset the failing age and fallen fortunes of a brave man he surely deserved, if ever man deserved, to have and to retain. His work was done; neither time nor trouble could affect that; neither age nor misfortune could undo it. He had lived long and worked hard, and the end of all the valiant labour and strenuous endurance that must have gone to the performance of his task had not been less than triumphant, He had added a monument to the temple which contains the glories of his native language, the godlike images and the costly relics of its past; he had built himself a