Page:Monsieur Bossu's Treatise of the epick poem - Le Bossu (1695).djvu/74

30 Besides, these two Establishments were made before the Destruction of the States which preceded them, and were the cause of their ruin. The Kingdom of Alba flourish'd during the Reign of the two first Roman Kings, but was erased by the Third: And Monarchy was extirpated by Brutus, and his Successors in the Consul-ship. It was of dangerous Consequence, to instil this Notion into the Subjects of Augustus, and to put the People upon thinking, that this Prince had ruined the Commonwealth, and banished their Liberty. The Truth of History furnished him with a thought more favourable to his design; since in reality Cicero and Tacitus do both inform us, "That before this Prince made the least shew of what he was about to do, there was no Commonwealth in being. All the vigour of the Empire was spent, the Laws were invalid, the Romans were nothing else but the Dregs of a State; and in short, there was nothing left of Rome but bare Walls, which were not able to last much longer". Thus Augustus destroyed nothing, he only re-established a tottering State. This is what the Poet is to prove, a great Empire ruin'd, of which his Hero was in no fault; and this very Empire more gloriously re-established by the Virtue, and the good Conduct of the Hero.

In the Roman History, Virgil did not meet with a Prince, who could with any probability keep up the Character of his chief Personage; he was obliged to look out for one some where else. Homer had this Advantage, that the Heroes of his Fables were Greeks, and that his own Country was the Theatre whereon most of the Fabulous Actions were transacted: So that he had liberty enough to accommodate himself to the Manners and Religion of those for whom he wrote.

But the Genius and Skill of the Latin Poet helped him to that which Fortune denied him. He took Horace's Advice, and had recourse to a Hero of the Iliad: And that he might make this stranger conform to the Religion of the Romans, he has feign'd, that the Hero came thither to bring into Italy all the Ceremonies, and to settle these Gods there, which ever since they have observ'd and ador'd. He has very luckily compleated this Conformity in ‡ the Customs and Manners by making the Trojans and Romans but one People. And he as well as Homer has caused that his Illustrious Heroes should be the Fathers of his Auditors; but with this Advantage, that he himself makes the Application of it to his Readers, with an equal measure of Wit and Applause.