Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 2.djvu/40

 ; because he wept more often, as they think, than well becomes a Man of Courage.

In the first place, if Tears are Arguments of Cowardise, what shall I say of Homer's Heroe? Shall Achilles pass for timorous, because he wept, and wept on less occasions than Æneas? Herein Virgil must be granted to have excell'd his Master. For once both Heroes are describ'd, lamenting their lost Loves: Briseis was taken away by force from the Grecians, Creusa was lost for ever to her Husband. But Achilles went roaring along the Salt-Sea-Shoar, and like a Booby, was complaining to his Mother, when he shou'd have reveng'd his Injury by Arms. Æneas took a Nobler Course; for having secur'd his Father and Son, he repeated all his former Dangers to have found his Wife, if she had been above ground. And here your Lordship may observe the Address of Virgil; it was not for nothing, that this Passage was related with all these tender Circumstances. Æneas told it; Dido heard it. That he had been so affectionate a Husband, was no ill Argument to the coming Dowager, that he might prove as kind to her. Virgil has a thousand secret Beauties, tho' I have not leisure to remark them.

Segrais on this Subject of a Heroe's shedding Tears, observes that Historians commend Alexander for weeping, when he read the mighty Actions of Achilles. And Julius Cæsar is likewise prais'd, when out of the same Noble Envy, he wept at the Victories of Alexander. But if we observe more closely, we shall find, that the Tears of Æneas were always on a laudable Occasion. Thus he weeps out of Compassion, and tenderness of Nature, when in the Temple of Carthage he beholds the Pictures of his Friends, who Sacrific'd their Lives in Defence of their Country. He deplores the lamentable End of his Pilot Palinurus; the untimely death of young Pallas his Confederate; and the rest,