It is certain, that there is, in that poetic ground, a kind of enchantment which allures every perfan of a tender and lively imagination; nor is this impreffion diminished, but rather much increafed by our early introduction to the knowledge of it, in our perufal of the Greek and Latin claffics. The fame great French critic makes the apology of Wilkie in his ufe of the ancient my. thology.

"Ainfi dans cet amas de poble fictions,
Le poete s'egaye en mille inventions,
Orne, eleve, embellit, agrandit toutes chofes,

Et trouve s'ons fa main des fleurs toujours eclofes."

It would feem, indeed, that, if some supernatural machinery be not admitted, epic poetry, at least all the marvellous part of it, must be entirely abandoned. "Without admiration," says Dr. Hurd, in his Letters on Chivalry and Romance" (which cannot be effected but by the marvellous of celefti Intervention, I mean the agency of fuperior natures really exifting, or by the illusion of the fancy taken to be fo), no epic phem can be long-lived The Christian religion, for many reasons, is unfit for the fabulous ornaments of poetry: The plan of Milton's work being altogether theological, his fupernatural beings form not the machinery, but are the principal actors in the poem. The introduction of allegory, after the manner of Voltaire, is liable to many objections: and though a mere historical epic poem like “ Leonidas," may have its beauties, it will always be inferior to the force and pathetic words of tragedy, and must refign to that species of poetry the precedency which the former compofition has always challenged among the productions of human genins

The fable of the Epigoniad is this: The poet fuppofes, that Cassandra, the daughter of Alcander king of Pelignium in Italy, was pursued by the love of Echetus, a barbarous tyrant in the neighbourhood; and as her father rejected his addreffes, he drew on himself the refentment of the ty rant, who made war upon him, and forced him to retire into Etolia, where Diomed gave him protection. This hero falls himself in love with Caffandra, and is fo fortunate as to make equal improns on her heart; but, before the completion of his marrriage, he is called to the fiege of Thebes, and leaves, as he supposes, Cassandra in Etolia with her father. But Caffandra, anxious for her lover's fafety, and unwilling to part from the object of her affections, had fecretly put on a man's habit, had attended him in the camp, and had fought by his fide in all his battles. The porm opens with the appearance of the Epigoni before the walls of Thebes, refolute to signalize their own names, and to redeem theirgive glory, by its reduction. The gods, affembled on the hundred heads of high Oympus, view from afar Thebes doomed to perish by the Argives, and principally by the hands of iomed. June and Pallas, favourable to the Argives, seek the ruin of Thebes Venus, in order to fruftrate the defign of both Juno and Pallas, deliberates concerning the proper method of raifing the fiege The fitteft expedient feems to be the exciting in Diomed a jealousy of C Jandra and persuading him, that her affe&ions were fecretly engaged to Echetus, and that the tyrant had invaded Etolia in pursuit of his mistress. Zelotype, a Paphian nymph, sprung from Cupid and Alecto, offers her services, for this end, to the goddess.

G ddefs thefe fhafts fhall compass what you aim,
My mother dipt their points in Stygian flame;
Where'er my father's darts their way have found,
Mine follow deep, and poison all the wound.
By chefe, we toen, with triumph, shall behold
Pallas deceiv'd, and Juno's felf controll'd.

Her perfon and flight are painted in the most characteristic habiliments and fplendid colours that poetry affords.

VOL. XI.

First to her feet the winged fhoes fhe binds,
Which tread the air and mount the rapid winds;
Aloft they bear her through th' ethereal plain,
Above the folid earth and liquid main;

Her arrows next she takes, of pointed steel,
For fight too fmall, but terrible to feel.-
A figurd zone, myfterially defign'd,
Around her waift her yellow robe confin'd;
There dark Sufpicion lurk'd, of sable hue,
There hafty Rage, her deadly dagger drew;
Pale Envy inly pin'd, and by her fide
Stood Frenzy raging with his arms unty'd.
Affronted Pride, with thirst of vengeance burn'd,
And Love's excefs to deepest hatred turn'd.
The virgin laft, around her shoulders flung
The bow, and by her fide the quiver hung:
Then, fpringing up, her airy course she bends
For Thebes; and lightly o'er the tents defcends.
The fon of Tydeus 'midf his bands the found
In arms complete, repofing on the ground;
And as he flept. the hero thus addrefs'd;

Her form to fancy's waking eye exprefs'd.

Diomed, moved by the instigations of jealousy, and eager to defend his mistress and his country, calls an affembly of the confederated kings, and proposes to raise the siege of Thebes, on account of the difficulty of the enterprise and dangers which furround the army. The kings debate concerning the propofal; and here appears a great diverfity of characters and fentiments, fuitable to each. Thefeus, the general, breaks out into a paffion at the propofal; but is pacified by Neftor. Idomeneus rifes, and reproaches Diomed for his dishonourable counsel; and, among other topics, upbraids him with his degeneracy from his father's bravery. The debate is closed by Ulyffes, who informs the princes, that the Thebans are preparing to march out in order to attack them, and that it is vain to deliberate any longer concerning the continuance of the war. The kings refolve to profecute the war, and Diomed, though ftung with love, and jealousy of Echetus, yields to their voice. The nations and tribes that opposed the Argives, being defcribed in the manner of Homer, a battle commences before the walls of Thebes; and the Theban troops, led on by the brave Leopbron, the fon of Crean the king, repulse the enemy. Pallas defcends to the aid of the Argives, in the form of Home leon, Diomed's charioteer being flain. Caffandra, ftill concealed under the arms and drefs of a foldier, prefenting herself to Diomed, offers to take that office upon herself. Diomed declines the offer. Pallas herself affumes the reins, and conducts Diomed in the fight. He kills Leopbron. Every thing gives way to this chief, guided by the wisdom, and fortified by the arms of the immortal goddess of Prudence and Wisdom: But Mercury, at the command of Jupiter, gives order to Phabus to lafh his steeds, and to conclude the day, left the rapid fuccefs of Diomed fhould precipitate the fall of Thebes before the time fixed by Fate. The darkness of the night interrupts the fight, and Diomed is stripped by Mercury of his divine armour. This battle is full of the fpirit of Homer. And now the Theban princes, according to ancient custom, fat in council in the gate; the king oppreffed with public cares, and with private grief for the death of his fon Leophron, proposes to fue for a truce of feven days, that they might grace the dead with funeral obfequies. The priest of Apollo, accompanied by Clytopben, repairs to the Argive tents, to ask a truce; and here follows a long, but very interesting episode, that enchants the reader with the wildness of Salvator Rofa, and aftonishes him with the terrors of Sophocles. This episode is intended as an experiment in that kind of fiction which diftinguishes the "Odysfey." The Theban heralds are conducted, with safety, to the royal tent, where the Argive princes receive them with marks of kindness. After a fplendid repaft, Clytophan, with great art, addreffes the Pylian chief Neftor, reminds him that he was his guest (a circumftance which formed a ftrong band of friendship, as it does still among barbarous nations) when he fled from the desert fhores of Trinacria: Having gained the favour and the attention of Neftor, he relates the wonderful ftory of his life. Clytopben was the youngest son of Orfilochus, king of Rhodes.

His youngest hope I was, and fcarce had seen
The tenth returning fummer clothe the green,

When pirates fnatch'd me from my native land, &c.

He relates how he arrived at Trinacria, efcaped from the pirates, and how that lawless crew perished by the inhuman hands of a Cyclops. In this defert ifland he remained for ten years. His folitary life, his terror of the Cyclops, his escape from the domain and from the threats of that menfter, who discovered him in his flight, form a wild and romantic tale, which affords a fatisfaction of a pleafing though melancholy nature. The Argive chiefs, won by the eloquence of Neftor, agree to the truce. Diomed alone remonftrates, and retires fullenly to his tent. The poet, in imi. tation of Homer, defcribes the funeral obfequies and various games in honour of the dead. The games he has chosen are different from those which are to be found among the ancients, and the incidents are new and curious. He meditates a design to attack the unarmed Thebans, confiding in the truce, and bufied in burying their dead. His friend, and the guardian of his youth, Deiphobar, diffuades him from fuch enormous injuftice, and expoftulates on this fubject, with a freedom which provokes the fiery temper of Diomed to lift his hand against his friend, and to put him to death. This incident, which is apt to surprise us, feems to have been copied by the poet from that circumftance in the life of Alexander, where the heroic conqueror, moved by a fudden paffion, ftabs Clytus, his ancient friend, by whom his life had been formerly faved in battle. The repentance of Diomed is equal to that of Alexander. No fooner had he ftruck the fatal blow than his eyes are opened; he is fenfible of his guilt and shame; he refuses all confolation; abstains even from food, and fhuts himfelf up alone in his tent. His followers, ftruck with horror at the violence of his paffion, keep at a distance from him. A tumult enfues, which is quelled by the eloquence of Ufe. While Diomed, abandoned by all, lay outstretched in the dust, refigned to melancholy, remorfe, and defpair, Caffandra enters his tent with a potion, which she had prepared for him. The virgin endeavours, by an artful tale, to fhun discovery, and to conceal her love. While the ftands before him alone, her timidity and paffion betray her fex; and Diomed immediately perceives her to be Caffandre. As his repentance for the murder of Deiphobus was now the ruling paffion in his mind, he is not moved by tenderness for Caffandra; on the contrary, he confiders her as the cause, however innocent, of the murder of his friend, and of his own guilt.

Thofe eyes I fee, whose foft enchantment stole
My peace, and stirr'd a tempest in my foul;
By their mild light, in innocence array'd,
To guilty madnefs was my heart betray'd.
Dei; hobus is dead; his mournful ghoft
Lamenting, wanders on the Stygian coaft;

And blames my wrath. Oh! that the fun which gave
Light to thy birth, had fet upon thy grave:
And he had liv'd! now lifelefs on the plain,

A corfe be les, and number'd with the flain.

Overwhelmed with grief at the treatment the received, Cassandra repairs to a rural temple, facred to Ceres, whofe protection fhe implores, proftrate on the ground, and bathed in a flood of tears. At this inftant, Zelotype defcended from Venus, but her counfels were overthrown by Pallas, difguiled in the fhape of Amyclea, Cassandra's mother. Caffandra's addreis to Amyclea will not lofe, by a comparison, with the addrefs of Anchifes to Æneas in the Ely fian fields. She refelves to return to her father's house, and had begun to put her defign in execution, when she fel into the hands of the Thebans. The fierce chiefs decree, that the fhall fall a facrifice to the ghofts of Leepbron and Andremon. This ftern purpofe is opposed by Phericles, who infifts upon the faith of treaties. A difpute arifes on the subject; fome of the princes infift on the death of Cassandra, others declare themselves ready to protect her life, at the risk of their own. And this difcord had raged in civil blood, had not Clytophen appealed the tumult, by propofing to practise on th

paffions of Diomed, by means of fo dear a pledge of his love, and to engage him to withdraw his forces from the walls of Thebes. Diomed, his rage fubfiding into grief, inquires at every leader for Cassandra, and is ftung with compuction for his barbarous usage of that lovely, affectionate, and patient maid. While his mind is thus foftened, an herald appears from the gates of Thebes, relates the fate of Cassandra, and delivers the king's meffage, threatening to put her to death if Diomed would not agree to a feparate truce with Thebes. This propofal raifes in the mind of Diomed oppofite contending paffions. Agreeably to the furious charader of that chief, the poet supposes that his predominant paffion for revenge is first excited. He rages and vows vengeance, if the Thebans fhould dare to violate the captive. An embroidered scarf, a prefent from Caffandra, brings her full into the view of Diomed, with all her charms. His rage is suspended, and he refigns his mind to love, to grief, and tender fear. He propofes a truce of twenty days, which the Thebans accept. In the mean time, Dienices returns, who had been fent to the wilderness of Eta to recal Hercules for the protection of his native city. He relates the death of Hercules, and the excruciating pains of the envenomed robe, which had been fent him by the hands of the jealous Dejanira. He relates alfo the fate of Cleon, fon of the king of Thebes, flain by Philodetes for an attempt to fleal away the arms of his friend Hercules, now enrolled among the gods. This epifode is an attempt towards heroic tragedy, in the manner of Sophocles, and breathes al! the horrors, and vehemence and atrocity of that great poet. If the fublimity of his imagination, and the energy of his ftyle appear any where confpicuous, it is in this ep fode, which we shall not fcruple to compare with any poetry the English language. Nothing can be more pathetic than the com plaints of Hercules; when the poifon of the envenomed robe begins firft to prey upon him.

O cool my boiling blood, ye winds that blow
From mountains loaded with eternal fnow,
And crack the icy cliffs: in vain! in vain!
Your rigour cannot quench my raging pain!
For round this heart the furies wave their brands,
And wring my entrails with their burning hands.

The virtue of Hercules, sustaining him under the weight of infernal pain, is described in a manner not unworthy of the fuprene grandeur of the fubject; and is a fpectacle, if we may be allowed, with Wilkie, to adopt the fontiments and the ftyle of the ancients, we would fay even the immortal gods would regard with comp acency and approbation.

The Theban king, enraged by the death of his fons, even to madness, despair, and hatred of the gods, inftigates his martial powers to attack the Argives, fecure in the truce, and employed in burying the dead The Argives encouraged by Pallas, in the form of Mentor, rally their forces and refift the Thebans with bravery, but without fuccefs. The rgive hands give way, and would have perished by the hands of an enraged victorious enemy, had not Pallas dispatched Ulyffes to folicit the aid of Diomed. The fpeech of Uses, in which the character of the fpeaker is well fupported, had its full influence on the mind of a generous warrior, ambitious of glory, and quickly fenfible to the ftings of reproach. He confeffe his paffion for the captive Caffandra; whom he deferibes with all the exaggerations of love. Ulyffes, having now learned the cause of Diomed's ina&ivity, addreffes himfelf to him with fuccefs He shows, that no faith was to be expected from the perfidious Thebans, and that the fafety of Cassandra might be obtained by force, but was not to be hoped for from a regard to juftice. M. ved by this reasoning, Diomed takes the field. The Thebans are forced to retreat and the ruthless Creon difpatches an affaffin to murder Caffandra. Here opens a fcene truly affe&ing. The queen of Thebes and her maids fat lamenting with the fair captive, talking to her in the language of complacency and tenderness, affuring her that her innocence, her fex, would protect her, and that nine fhort days would refore her freedom: Bat Caffandra, prepared to meet her fate, by a dream, arms herself with magnanimous refolution, and, when the murderer approached, with the fword bared for cxecution, in the midft of her weeping attendants, she alone appeared erect and undaunted,

For the blow prepar'd,'

With both her hands her fhining neck the bar'd,
And round her head a purple garment roll'd,
With leaves of filver mark'd, and flowing gold.
Rais'd for the ftroke, the glittering faulchion hung,
And swift descending, bore the head along.
A tide of gore, diffus d in purple fireams,
Dafhes the wall. and o'er the pavement swims.
Prone to the ground, the headless trunk reclines,

And life, in long convulsive throbs, resigns.

In the mean time, Diamed advises the Argive chiefs to take Thebes by affault. Idameneus oppofes fo rafh a defign; and, in the midst of this difpute, Green displays, on the point of a fpear. the head of Caffandra. Diomed leads on his powers to the affault of Thebes, while the other orgive bands, in favour of his attempt, distract the foe by mock approaches. The city is taken. The queen, made captive, implores the mercy of Diomed. Ulyffes advites him to offer her up a victim to the manes of Caffandra. The generous hero rejects the barbarous counsel; and the poem concludes with the death of Creon.

It is a manifeft advantage in the Epigoniad, that the scenes it describes lie within a very narrow fpace of time: that events follow events in rapid fucceffion; and that, on the whole, it maintains the closest and most perfect unity of time, place, and action. The moral is no other than what is the moral of many tragedies, the fatal effects of love. But the poet has found means artfully to extend the moral to paffion in general: For Diomed, in a kind of peroration to the whole of what bad passed, deplores the predominancy of passion, ever deaf to reason and cool reflection,

While I, unhappy, by its dictates fway'd,

My guardian murder'd, and the host betray'd.

The falle is evidently ingeniously artificial; but the execution is better than the design, the poetry fuperior to the fable, and the colouring of the particular parts more excellent than the general plan of the whole. Of the four great epic poems which have been the admiration of mankind, the * Iliad,”* Æneid,” “ Jerufalem,” and “Paradife Loft," the " Jerufalem” alone would make a tolerable novel, if reduced to profe, and related without that fplendeur of verfification and imagery by which it is supported; yet, in the opinion of many great judges, the "Jerusalem" is the leaft perfc&t of these productions, chiefly because it has leaft nature and fimplicity in the sentiments, and is met habe to the objection of affectation and conceit. The ftory of a poem, whatever may be imagined, is the least effential part of it, the force of the verfification, the vivacity of the images, the juftnefs of the defcriptions, the natural play of the paffions, are the chief circumstances which difinguish the great poet from the profaic novelift; and we will venture to affirm, that all these advantages, especially the three former are to be found in an eminent degree in the Epigoniad. Wil kie, is fpired with the true genius of Greece, and fmit with the most profound veneration for Ho mer, difdains all frivolous ornaments, and, relying entirely on his fub ime imagination and his ner. vous and harmonious expreffion, has ventured to present to his reader the naked beauties of nature, and challenges, for his partizans, all the admirers of genuine antiquity.

There is one circumftance in which Wilkie has carried his boldness of copying antiquity beyond the practice of many, even judicious moderns. He has drawn his perfonages, not only with all the fimplicity of the Grecian heroes, but also with fome degree of their roughness, and even of their fe. rocity. This is a circumstance which a mere modern is apt to find fault with in Homer, and which, perhaps, he will not easily excufe in his imitator. It is certain that the ideas of manners are much changed fince the age of Homer, and though the “Iliad” was always, among the ancients, conceiv ed to be a panegyric on the Greeks, yet the reader is now almost always on the fide of the Trojans, and is much more interested for the humane and soft manners of Priam, Hector, Andromache, Sarpedon, Epeas, Glaucus, nay, even of Paris and Helen, than for the fevere and cruel bravery of Achilles