Page:Proofs of the Enquiry into Homer's Life and Writings.pdf/56

Rh Homer'j Life and Writings.

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Plato calls aMind fit for Poetry, YTXHNSect. ABATON; zSouluntrod. It is opposed to VIII. what our Shakejpear calls, a Mind beaten and pTiT7(0 hackney'd in the Ways of Men. T»<m7)





It is a curious Observation made by Velleius Paterculus, M That the Cities (of Thebes and f£ Lacedæmon) two of the first States in Greece, " were Soils quite barren of Poetry and Learnf* ing; excepting that Thebes had been made f* famous by Pindar's single Voice : For it is " without Foundation that the Lacedæmonians the Enquiry, to prove * that a Mind strictly ' moulded by Forms and Discipline is incapable f of sublime Poetry, which is the most exten' five Imitation of Men and various Manners. ' The Order of a Town, he says, eludes the ' consequently cramp both Fancy and Expresf sion/ Nothing can be more just than the fol lowing Character of Homer's Manner and Style given by Plutarch ; and nothing more opposite to the ordinary well-known Round ofa TownLife. 1
 * ' claim Alctnan as their Town's-Man."This Observation is employed by the Author of
 * Passions;—the Restraints of it blunt them, and

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