Transcriber's Note
Non-italic phrases within italic text blocks are marked with ~swung
dashes~.
STUDIES ON HOMER
AND
THE HOMERIC AGE.
BY THE
RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, D.C.L.
M. P. FOR THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
Plenius ac melius Chrysippo et Crantore.--HORACE.
OXFORD:
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
M.DCCC.LVIII.
[_The right of Translation is reserved._]
STUDIES ON HOMER
AND
THE HOMERIC AGE.
I. PROLEGOMENA.
II. ACHÆIS:
OR,
THE ETHNOLOGY OF THE GREEK RACES.
BY THE
RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, D.C.L.
M. P. FOR THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
Plenius ac melius Chrysippo et Crantore.--HORACE.
OXFORD:
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
M.DCCC.LVIII.
THE CONTENTS.
I. PROLEGOMENA.
SECT. I.
_On the State of the Homeric Question._
Objects of this Work Page 1
Results thus far of the Homeric Controversy 2
Improved apparatus for the Study of Homer 4
Effect of the poems on Civilization 5
They do not compete with the Holy Scriptures 6
SECT. II.
_The Place of Homer in Classical Education._
Study of Homer in the English Universities 9
Homer should not be studied as a Poet only 11
His claims compared with those of other Poets 14
Study of Homer in the Public Schools 18
SECT. III.
_On the Historic Aims of Homer._
High organization of the Poems 21
The presumption is that the Poet had Historic aims 22
Positive signs of them 23
Pursued even at some cost of Poetical beauty 26
Minuter indications 28
General tone 28
Hypothesis of reproduction inadmissible 30
What is chiefly meant by his Historic aims 35
SECT. IV.
_On the probable Date of Homer._
The main question: is he an original witness 36
Adverse arguments 37
Affirmative arguments 39
SECT. V.
_The probable Trustworthiness of the Text of Homer._
The received text to be adopted as a basis 42
Failure of other methods 44
State of the Manuscripts 46
Complaints of interpolation 47
Testimonies concerning the early use of the Poems 49
Preservative power of the Recitations or matches 55
Pseudo-Homeric poems 56
Argument from the Cyclic poems 59
The Alexandrian period 60
Amount and quality of guarantees 64
Improbability of wilful falsification 67
Internal evidence of soundness in detail 69
SECT. VI.
_Place and Authority of Homer in Historical Inquiry._
Homer paramount as a literary authority 71
He has suffered through credulity 73
And through incredulity 79
Proposed method of treatment 81
Instances of contrary method, (1) Hellen and his family 82
Authority of Hesiod 84
Instance (2), personality of Helen 87
Conclusion 89
II. ACHÆIS.
ETHNOLOGY OF THE GREEK RACES.
SECT. I.
_Scope of the Inquiry._
Preliminary objection of Mr. Grote stated 93
Synopsis of national and tribal names to be examined 96
SECT. II.
_On the Pelasgians, and cognate races._
The Pelasgians 100
Pelasgic Argos 101
Dodona 106
Thessaly and the Southern Islands 109
Epithets for Pelasgians 113
Use of this name in the singular 114
The Pelasgians and Larissa 115
The Arcadians Pelasgian 119
Why προσέληνοι 121
The Arcadians afterwards the Swiss of Greece 122
The Graians or Greeks 123
Ceres and the Pelasgians 124
The Iaones or Ionians 127
The Athenians in the Catalogue 129
The Catalogue, vv. 546-9 129
The same, vv. 550, 132
The same, vv. 553-5 135
Review of the Homeric evidence as to the Athenians 137
Their relations with Minerva 140
Post-Homeric evidence of the Pelasgianism of Attica 145
The Pelasgians related to Egypt 148
The Egyptians semi-fabulous to Homer 151
Their Pelasgian resemblances, in Homer and otherwise 153
The Greeks of the Iliad why never termed Pelasgian 156
The Θρῇκες and Θρῃίκιοι 158
The Caucones and Leleges 161
SECT. III.
_The Pelasgians: and certain States naturalized or
akin to Greece._
Minos in Homer 166
His origin 167
His place in the nether world 168
The power of Crete 169
Two of the five races apparently Pelasgian 170
The tradition of Deucalion 172
The extent of the Minoan Empire 175
Evidence of Post-Homeric tradition 176
Circumstantial evidence 178
The Lycians 181
Their points of connection with Greece 183
Elements of the population 185
Cyprus 188
Inhabitants probably Pelasgian 190
No other name competes with the Pelasgian as designating
the first inhabitants of Greece 193
The Pelasgians were the base or _substratum_ of the
Greek nation 194
Post-Homeric testimony respecting them 195
K. O. Müller’s Summary 200
The Pelasgian language 203
The Pelasgian route into Greece 205
Probably twofold 206
Route of the Helli 208
Peloponnesus the old centre of power 209
Derivation of the Pelasgian name 211
SECT. IV.
_On the Phœnicians and the Outer Geography of
the Odyssey._
Tokens of the Phœnicians in Greece 216
Limits of Homer’s Inner or Greek Geography 217
And Greek Navigation 219
His Outer Geography Phœnician 221
The traditions connected therewith also Phœnician 223
Minos the Ὀλοόφρων 225
Commercial aptitude of the modern Greeks 227
The Homeric Mouth of Ocean 228
The two Geographical reports are blended into one 228
The Siceli and Sicania 229
Their site is probably on the Bruttian Coast 231
The Epirus of Homer 234
The Thesprotians in Homer 235
The Cadmeans in Homer 239
Period from which they date 240
Conclusions respecting them 244
SECT. V.
_On the Catalogue._
The Greek Catalogue, properly an Array or Review 245
The Preface 246
The List 247
The principle of arrangement 249
The distribution in chief 250
The sub-distribution 251
Proofs of historic aim 255
Genealogies of the Catalogue 256
The Epilogue 259
The Trojan Catalogue 261
SECT. VI.
_On the Hellenes of Homer._
The word Hellas the key to this inquiry 264
List of passages where used 265
Some of them admit the narrow sense 266
Some refuse it 268
None require it 272
Hellenes in Il. ii. 684 274
Panhellenes in Il. ii. 530 277
Cephallenes in Il. ii. 631 and elsewhere 278
The Helli or Selli 279
Selli of the Scholiast of Aristophanes 280
SECT. VII.
_On the respective contributions of the Pelasgian and
Hellenic factors to the compound of the Greek nation._
Contributions to Mythology 285
Correspondences with Rome and Troy 287
The Pelasgian religion less imaginative 289
Their ritual development fuller 290
Order of Priests in Homer not Hellenic 293
Contributions to language 294
Classes of words which agree 298
Classes which differ 301
Evidence from names of persons 307
General rules of discrimination 309
Names of the Pelasgian class 311
Names of the Hellenic class 317
Contributions to political ideas 320
To martial ideas 320
Corporal education and Games 322
Music and Song 329
Supposed Pelasgianism of the Troic age 331
The traditions of Hunting 332
The practice of Navigation 336
Summary of the case 338
States especially Hellic or Pelasgic 342
SECT. VIII.
_On the three greater Homeric appellatives._
Modes of formation for names of peoples 346
The three greater appellatives not synonymous 348
Proofs of their distinctive use 350
The Argive Juno, Argive Helen 353
The Danaans of Homer 355
Epithets of the three appellatives 356
The Danaan name dynastic 359
Compared with the Cadmean name 361
Epoch of the dynasty 363
Post-Homeric tradition 366
Application of the name Argos 368
Achaic and Iasian Argos 373
The phrase μέσον Ἄργος 378
The Apian land 379
Summary of geographical conclusions 380
Etymology of the word Argos 381
Its connection with ἔργον 384
The etymology tested by kindred words 388
The Danaan Argeians of Od. viii. 578 391
The Argive Juno 392
Transition to Achæans 393
Relation of Argeian and Pelasgian names 396
The etymology illustrated 397
Different extent of Ἀργεῖοι and Ἄργος 401
Propositions as to the Achæan name 402
Particulars of its use 403
Signs of its leaning to the aristocracy 406
Mode of its application in Ithaca 411
Its local sense in Thessaly 416
In Crete 417
In Pylos 418
In Eastern Peloponnesus 419
Force of the name Παναχαιοὶ 420
The Æolid and Æolian names 423
The Heraclids in Homer 425
The descent of the Æolids 427
The earliest Hellenic thrones in Greece 429
The Danaan and Argive names used nationally in
poetry only 431
Summary of the evidence 433
Later literary history of the three great appellatives 436
Their value as primitive History 437
SECT. IX.
_On the Homeric title of ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν._
Difference between Epithets and Titles 440
Examples of Homeric titles 443
The Βασιλεὺς of Homer 443
Common interpretations of the ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν 443
Some particulars of its use in Homer 446
How far connected with metrical convenience 447
The κρείων and the ποιμὴν λαῶν 448
Arguments for a specific meaning in ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν 450
Persons to whom the title is applied 453
Persons to whom it might have been applied 455
Associations of reverence with it 456
It may indicate patriarchal chieftaincy 459
Presumptions of this in the case of Agamemnon 461
Propositions respecting his extraction and station 463
Arguments against his Hellenic descent considered 465
Connection of Tantalus with Greece and with Pelops 466
As to the seat of his power 470
Homeric notices of Pelops 471
The Achæans rose with him 472
They came from Thessaly 474
The Dorians appropriate the Pelopid succession 477
Protest against the popular tradition of the Hellenidæ 480
Which, however, bears witness to the connection
with Thessaly 481
Case of Agamemnon summed up 482
The cases of Anchises and Æneas 484
Presumptive evidence as to Anchises 486
Presumptive evidence as to Æneas 486
Evidence from the Dardanid genealogy 489
From the horses of Tros 490
Evidence summed up 491
Signs of kin between Trojans and Greeks 492
Signs connected with the Hellic name 496
The Hellespont of Homer 497
The gift of Echepolus Anchisiades 499
Twofold bond, Hellic as well as Pelasgic 499
Case of Augeias stated 500
Notes of connection between Elis and the North 502
Relation of Augeias to the name Ephyre 504
Cluster of apparently cognate names 505
The race of Φῆρες 509
Common root of all these names 510
Probable signification of Ἐφύρη 513
Places bearing the name Ἐφύρη 515
Summary of the evidence for Augeias 519
Case of Euphetes 520
The site of his Ephyre 521
Case of Eumelus 526
The ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν is descended from Jupiter 529
The four notes of the ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν 531
Negative proofs 532
Persons with the four notes but without the title 536
Its disappearance with Homer 538
Signs in the Iliad of political disorganization 539
More extensively in the Odyssey 542
General significancy of the title ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν 543
SECT. X.
_On the connection of the Hellenes and Achæans
with the East._
The Achæan name has no mark of a Greek origin 545
Means for pursuing the inquiry 546
The two groups of Indo-European languages 547
Corresponding distinction of races 548
Province of Fars or Persia proper 549
Ascendancy of the Persians 550
Relation of the Germani to the Celts 551
And to the Hellenes 552
The Persian tribe of Γερμάνιοι 554
The Homeric traces of the Persian name 555
The Achæan name in Persia 556
Its probable etymology 557
The Persians according to Herodotus 558
The comparison as to religious belief 561
As to ritual, and other resemblances 563
Evidence of the Behistun inscription 565
The organization established by Darius 566
Presumptions from the term Βασιλεύς 567
Hellenic traits in modern Persia 568
The Eelliats 571
Media a probable source of the Pelasgi 571
ADDENDA 573
STUDIES ON HOMER AND THE HOMERIC AGE.
I. PROLEGOMENA.[1]
SECT. 1.--_On the State of the Homeric question._
We are told that, in an ancient city, he who had a new law to propose
made his appearance, when about to discharge that duty, with a halter
round his neck. It might be somewhat rigid to re-introduce this
practice in the case of those who write new books on subjects, with
which the ears at least of the world are familiar. But it is not
unreasonable to demand of them some such reason for their boldness as
shall be at any rate presumably related to public utility. Complying
with this demand by anticipation, I will place in the foreground an
explicit statement of the objects which I have in view.
These objects are twofold: firstly, to promote and extend the fruitful
study of the immortal poems of Homer; and secondly, to vindicate for
them, in an age of discussion, their just degree both of absolute and,
more especially, of relative critical value. My desire is to indicate
at least, if I cannot hope to establish, their proper place, both
in the discipline of classical education, and among the materials of
historical inquiry. When the world has been hearing and reading Homer,
and talking and writing about him, for nearly three thousand years,
it may seem strange thus to imply that he is still an ‘inheritor of
unfulfilled renown,’[2] and not yet in full possession of his lawful
throne. He who seems to impeach the knowledge and judgment of all
former ages, himself runs but an evil chance, and is likely to be found
guilty of ignorance and folly. Such, however, is not my design. There
is no reason to doubt that Greece
Dum fortuna fuit
knew right well her own noble child, and paid him all the homage that
even he could justly claim. But in later times, and in most of the
lands where he is a foreigner, I know not if he has ever yet enjoyed
his full honour from the educated world. He is, I trust, coming to it;
and my desire is to accelerate, if ever so little, the movement in that
direction.
As respects the first portion of the design which has been described,
I would offer the following considerations. The controversy _de vitâ
et sanguine_, concerning the personality of the poet, and the unity
and antiquity of the works, has been carried on with vigour for near a
century. In default of extraneous testimony, the materials of warfare
have been sedulously sought in the rich mine which was offered by the
poems themselves. There has resulted from this cause a closer study of
the text, and a fuller development of much that it contains, than could
have been expected in times when the student of Homer had only to enjoy
his banquet, and not to fight for it before he could sit down. It is
not merely, however, in warmth of feeling that he may have profited;
the Iliad and the Odyssey have been, from the absolute necessity of the
case, put into the witness-box themselves, examined and cross-examined
in every variety of temper, and thus, in some degree at least, made
to tell their own story. The result has been upon the whole greatly
in their favour. The more they are searched and tested, the more does
it appear they have to say, and the better does their testimony hang
together. The more plain does it become, that the arguments used on the
side of scepticism and annihilation are generally of a technical and
external character, and the greater is the mass of moral and internal
evidence continually accumulated against them. In consequence, there
has set in a strong reaction among scholars, even in Germany (in
England the destructive theories never greatly throve), on behalf of
the affirmative side of all, or nearly all, the main questions which
had been raised. Mure,[3] the last and perhaps most distinguished of
British writers on this subject, has left the debate in such a state
that those who follow him may be excused, and may excuse their readers,
from systematic preliminary discussion; and may proceed upon the
assumption that the Iliad and Odyssey are in their substance the true
offspring of the heroic age itself, and are genuine gifts not only of a
remote antiquity but of a designing mind; as well as that he, to whom
that mind belonged, has been justly declared by the verdict of all ages
to be the patriarch of poets. These controversies have been ‘bolted to
the bran;’ for us at least they are all but dead, and to me it seems
little better than lost time to revive them.
Having then at the present day the title to the estate in some degree
secured from litigation, we may enter upon the fruition of it, and with
all the truer zest on account of the conflict, which has been long and
keenly fought, and in the general opinion fairly won. It now becomes
all those, who love Homer, to prosecute the sure method of inquiry
and appreciation by close, continued, comprehensive study of the
text; a study of which it would be easy to prove the need, by showing
how inaccurately the poems are often cited in quarters, to which the
general reader justifiably looks for trustworthy information. To this
we have been exhorted by the writer already named:[4] and we have
only to make his practice our model. That something has already been
attained, we may judge by comparison. Let us take a single instance.
In the year 1735 was published ‘Blackwell’s Inquiry into the Life and
Writings of Homer.’ Bentley, as it would appear from Bishop Monk’s
Life[5] of that extraordinary scholar, was not to be taken in by a
book of this kind: but such men as Bentley are not samples of their
time, they are living symbols and predictions of what it will require
years or generations to accomplish. We may rather judge of the common
impression made by this book, from the Notes to Pope’s Preface to the
Iliad, where Warton[6] extols it as ‘a work that abounds in curious
researches and observations, and places Homer in a new light.’ But no
reader of Homer, in our own time, would really, I apprehend, be the
poorer, if every copy of it could be burned.
Since the time of Blackwell’s work, important aids have been gained
towards the study of Homer, by the researches of travellers, fruitful
in circumstantial evidence, and by the discovery of the Venetian
Scholia, as well as by the persevering labours of modern critics.
We have been gradually coming to understand that these precious
works, which may have formed the delight of our boyhood, have also
been designed to instruct our maturer years. I do not here refer
to their poetic power and splendour only. It is now time that we
should recognise the truth, that they constitute a vast depository of
knowledge upon subjects of deep interest, and of boundless variety;
and that this is a knowledge, too, which can be had from them alone.
It was the Greek mind transferred, without doubt, in some part through
Italy, but yet only transferred, and still Greek both in origin and
in much of its essence, in which was shaped and tempered the original
mould of the modern European civilization. I speak now of civilization
as a thing distinct from religion, but destined to combine and coalesce
with it. The power derived from this source was to stand in subordinate
conjunction with the Gospel, and to contribute its own share towards
the training of mankind. From hence were to be derived the forms and
materials of thought, of imaginative culture, of the whole education
of the intellectual soul, which, when pervaded with an higher life from
the Divine fountain, was thus to be secured from corruption, and both
placed and kept in harmony with the world of spirits.
This Greek mind, which thus became one of the main factors of the
civilized life of Christendom, cannot be fully comprehended without the
study of Homer, and is nowhere so vividly or so sincerely exhibited as
in his works. He has a world of his own, into which, upon his strong
wing, he carries us. There we find ourselves amidst a system of ideas,
feelings, and actions, different from what are to be found anywhere
else; and forming a new and distinct standard of humanity. Many among
them seem as if they were then shortly about to be buried under a mass
of ruins, in order that they might subsequently reappear, bright and
fresh for application, among later generations of men. Others of them
almost carry us back to the early morning of our race, the hours of its
greater simplicity and purity, and more free intercourse with God. In
much that this Homeric world exhibits, we see the taint of sin at work,
but far, as yet, from its perfect work and its ripeness; it stands
between Paradise and the vices of later heathenism, far from both,
from the latter as well as from the former; and if among all earthly
knowledge, the knowledge of man be that which we should chiefly court,
and if to be genuine it should be founded upon experience, how is it
possible to over-value this primitive representation of the human race
in a form complete, distinct, and separate, with its own religion,
ethics, policy, history, arts, manners, fresh and true to the standard
of its nature, like the form of an infant from the hand of the Creator,
yet mature, full, and finished, in its own sense, after its own laws,
like some masterpiece of the sculptor’s art.
The poems of Homer never can be put in competition with the Sacred
Writings of the Old Testament, as regards the one invaluable code
of Truth and Hope that was contained in them. But while the Jewish
records exhibit to us the link between man and the other world in the
earliest times, the poems of Homer show us the being, of whom God was
pleased to be thus mindful, in the free unsuspecting play of his actual
nature. The patriarchal and Jewish dispensations created, and sustained
through Divine interposition, a state of things essentially special
and exceptional: but here first we see our kind set to work out for
itself, under the lights which common life and experience supplied, the
deep problem of his destiny. Nor is there, perhaps, any more solemn and
melancholy lesson, than that which is to be learned from its continual
downward course. If these words amount to a begging of the question,
at least, it is most important for us to know whether the course was
continually downwards; whether, as man enlarged his powers and his
resources, he came nearer to, or went farther from his happiness and
his perfection. Now, this inquiry cannot, for Europe and Christendom at
least, be satisfactorily conducted, except in commencing from the basis
which the Homeric poems supply. As regards the great Roman people,
we know nothing of them, which is at once archaic and veracious. As
regards the Greeks, it is Homer that furnishes the point of origin
from which all distances are to be measured. When the historic period
began, Greece was already near its intellectual middle-age. Little can
be learned of the relative movements of our moral and our mental nature
severally, from matching one portion of that period with another, in
comparison with what we may gather from bringing into neighbourhood and
contrast the pristine and youthful Greece of Homer on the one hand,
and, on the other, the developed and finished Greece of the age of the
tragedians or the orators.
The Mosaic books, and the other historical books of the Old Testament,
are not intended to present, and do not present, a picture of human
society, or of our nature drawn at large. Their aim is to exhibit it
in one master-relation, and to do this with effect, they do it, to a
great extent, exclusively. The Homeric materials for exhibiting that
relation are different in kind as well as in degree: but as they paint,
and paint to the very life, the whole range of our nature, and the
entire circle of human action and experience, at an epoch much more
nearly analogous to the patriarchal time than to any later age, the
poems of Homer may be viewed, in the philosophy of human nature, as the
complement of the earliest portion of the Sacred Records.
Although the close and systematic study of the Homeric text has begun
at a date comparatively recent, yet the marked development of riches
from within which it has produced, has already been a real, permanent,
and vast addition to the mental wealth of mankind. We can now better
understand than formerly much that relates to the fame and authority
of this great poet in early times, and that we may formerly have
contemplated as fanciful, exaggerated, or unreal. It was, we can now
see, with no idle wonder that, while Greek philosophers took texts
from him so largely in their schools, the Greek public listened to his
strains in places of thronged resort, and in their solemn assemblages,
and Greek warriors and statesmen kept him in their cabinets and under
their pillows; and, for the first and last time in the history of the
world, made the preservation of a poet’s compositions an object of
permanent public policy.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Revised and enlarged from the ‘Essay on the place of Homer in
Classical education and in Historical inquiry,’ which was contained in
the ‘Oxford Essays’ for 1857, published by Mr. J. W. Parker.
[2] Shelley’s Adonais.
[3] While speaking of this eminent labourer in the field of Homeric
inquiry, I must not pass by the sympathising spirit and imagination
of Mr. H. Nelson Coleridge, the admirably turned Homeric tone of the
ballads of Dr. Maginn, or the valuable analysis contained in the
uncompleted ‘Homerus’ of Archdeacon Williams. But of all the criticisms
on Homer which I have ever had the good fortune to read, in our own or
any language, the most vivid and entirely genial are those found in
the ‘Essays Critical and Imaginative’ of the late Professor Wilson.
In that most useful, and I presume I may add standard, work, Smith’s
‘Dictionary of Classical Biography and Mythology,’ I am sorry to find
that the important article Homerus, by Dr. Ihne, though it has the
merit of presenting the question in a clear light, yet is neither
uniformly accurate in its references to the text of Homer, nor at all
in conformity with the prevailing state at least of English opinion
upon the controversy.
[4] Mure’s History of Grecian Literature, vol. i. p. 10.
[5] 4to ed. p. 622, n.
[6] Warton’s Pope, vol. iv. p. 371, n.
SECT. 2.--_The Place of Homer in Classical Education._
Now, from these considerations may arise the important question, Does
Homer hold in our English education the place which is his due, and
which it would be for our advantage to give him? An immense price is
paid by the youth of this country for classical acquirement. It is the
main effort of the first spring-tide of their intellectual life. It is
to be hoped that this price will continue to be paid by all those, who
are qualified to profit by the acquisition; and that though of other
knowledge much more will hereafter be gained than heretofore, yet of
this there shall on no account be less. Still, viewing the greatness
of the cost, which consists in the chief energies of so many precious
years, it highly concerns us to see that what we get in return is good
both in measure and in quality. What, then, are the facts with respect
to the study of Homer in England at the present day?
I must here begin with the apology due from one who feels himself to
be far from perfectly informed on the case of which it is necessary to
give an outline. But even if I understate both the amount of Homeric
study, and its efficiency, there will, I am confident, remain, after
every due allowance shall have been made for error, ample room for
the application of the general propositions that I seek to enforce.
They are these: that the study of Homer in our Universities is as yet
below the point to which it is desirable that it should be carried, and
that the same study, carried on at our public Schools, neither is,
nor can be made, a fitting substitute for what is thus wanting at the
Universities.
In my own day, at Oxford, now a full quarter of a century ago, the
poems of Homer were read chiefly by way of exception, and in obedience
to the impulse of individual tastes. They entered rather materially
into those examinations by which scholarship was principally to be
tested, but they scarcely formed a substantive or recognised part
of the main studies of the place, which were directed to the final
examination in the Schools for the Bachelor’s degree. I do not
recollect to have ever heard at that time of their being used as the
subject matter of the ordinary tutorial lectures; and if they were so,
the case was certainly a rare one. Although the late Dr. Gaisford, in
the estimation of many the first scholar of his age, during his long
tenure of the Deanery of Christ Church, gave the whole weight of his
authority to the recommendation of Homeric study, it did not avail
to bring about any material change. The basis of the Greek classical
instruction lay chiefly in the philosophers, historians, and later
poets; and when Homer was, in the academical phrase, ‘taken up,’ he was
employed ornamentally, and therefore superficially, and was subjected
to no such searching and laborious methods of study as, to the great
honour and advantage of Oxford, were certainly applied to the authors
who held the first rank in her practical system. I am led to believe
that the case at Cambridge was not essentially different, although,
from the greater relative space occupied there by examinations in pure
scholarship, it is probable that Homer may, under that aspect at least,
have attracted a greater share of attention.
When, however, the University of Oxford brought to maturity, in the
year 1850, a new Statute of examinations, efforts were made to promote
an extended study of Homer. Those efforts, it happily appears, have
produced a considerable effect. Provision was made by that statute for
dividing the study of the poets from the philosophical and historical
studies, and for including the former in the intermediate, or, as it is
termed, ‘first public’ examination, while both the latter were reserved
for the final trial, with which the period of undergraduateship is
usually wound up. All candidates for honours in this intermediate
examination are now required to present not less than twelve Books
of Homer on the list of works in which they are to be examined. And
I understand that he has also taken his place among the regular
subjects of the tutorial lectures. This is a great sign of progress;
and it may confidently be hoped that, under these circumstances, Homer
will henceforward hold a much more forward position in the studies
of Oxford. There remains something to desire, and that something, I
should hope, any further development of the Examination Statute of the
University will supply.
It is clear, that the study of this great master should not be confined
to preparation for examinations which deal principally with language,
or which cannot enter upon either primitive history, or philosophy, or
policy, or religion, except by way of secondary illustration. Better
far that he should be studied simply among the poets, than that he
should not be studied at all. But as long as he is read only among the
poets, he cannot, I believe, be read effectively for the higher and
more varied purposes of which Homeric study is so largely susceptible.
The grammar, metre, and diction, the tastes, the whole poetic handling
and qualities of Homer, do, indeed, offer an assemblage of objects for
our consideration at once and alike singular, attractive, extended,
and profitable. The extraneous controversies with which his name has
so long been associated as to his personality and date, and as to the
unity and transmission of his works, although they are for us, I trust,
in substance nearly decided, yet are not likely to lose their literary
interest, were it only on account of the peculiarly convenient and
seductive manner in which they open up many questions of primitive
research; presenting these questions to us, as they do, not in the
dull garb pieced out of antiquarian scraps, but alive, and in the full
movement of vigorous debate. All this is fit for delightful exercise;
but much more lies behind.
There is an inner Homeric world, of which his verse is the tabernacle
and his poetic genius the exponent, but which offers in itself a
spectacle of the most profound interest, quite apart from him who
introduces us to it, and from the means by which we are so introduced.
This world of religion and ethics, of civil policy, of history and
ethnology, of manners and arts, so widely severed from all following
experience, that we may properly call them palæozoic, can hardly be
examined and understood by those, who are taught to approach Homer as a
poet only.
Indeed, the transcendency of his poetical distinctions has tended to
overshadow his other claims and uses. As settlers in the very richest
soils, saturated with the fruits which they almost spontaneously yield,
rarely turn their whole powers to account, so they, that are taught
simply to repair to Homer for his poetry, find in him, so considered,
such ample resources for enjoyment, that, unless summoned onwards by a
distinct and separate call, they are little likely to travel further.
It was thus that Lord Bacon’s brilliant fame as a philosopher diverted
public attention from his merits as a political historian.[7] It was
thus, to take a nearer instance, that most readers of Dante, while
submitting their imaginations to his powerful sway, have been almost
wholly unconscious that they were in the hands of one of the most
acute and exact of metaphysicians, one of the most tender, earnest,
and profound among spiritual writers. Here, indeed, the process has
been simpler in form; for the majority, at least, of readers, have
stopped with the striking, and, so to speak, incorporated imagery of
the ‘Inferno,’ and have not so much as read the following, which are
also the loftier and more ethereal, portions of the ‘Divina Commedia.’
It may be enough for Homer’s fame, that the consent of mankind has
irrevocably assigned to him a supremacy among poets, without real
competitors or partners, except Dante and Shakspeare; and that,
perhaps, if we take into view his date, the unpreparedness of the
world for works so extraordinary as his, the comparative paucity of
the traditional resources and training he could have inherited, he
then becomes the most extraordinary, as he is also the most ancient,
phenomenon in the whole history of purely human culture. In particular
points he appears to me, if it be not presumptuous to say so much, to
remain to this day unquestionably without an equal in the management of
the poetic art. If Shakspeare be supreme in the intuitive knowledge of
human nature and in the rapid and fertile vigour of his imagination, if
Dante have the largest grasp of the ‘height and depth’ of all things
created, if he stand first in the power of exhibiting and producing
ecstasy, and in the compressed and concentrated energy[8] of thought
and feeling, Homer, too, has his own peculiar prerogatives. Among them
might perhaps be placed the faculty of high oratory; the art of turning
to account epithets and distinctive phrases; the production of indirect
or negative effects; and the power of creating and sustaining dramatic
interest without the large use of wicked agents, in whom later poets
have found their most indispensable auxiliaries. But all this is not
enough for us who read him. If the works of Homer are, to letters and
to human learning, what the early books of Scripture are to the entire
Bible and to the spiritual life of man; if in them lie the beginnings
of the intellectual life of the world, then we must still recollect
that that life, to be rightly understood, should be studied in its
beginnings. There we may see in simple forms what afterwards grew
complex, and in clear light what afterwards became obscure; and there
we obtain starting-points, from which to measure progress and decay
along all the lines upon which our nature moves.
Over and above the general plea here offered for the study of Homer
under other aspects than such as are merely poetical, there is
something to be said upon his claims in competition with other, and
especially with other Greek poets. The case of the Latin poets, nearer
to us historically, more accessible in tongue, more easily retained in
the mind under the pressure of after-life, more readily available for
literary and social purposes, must stand upon its own grounds.
In considering what is the place due to Homer in education, we cannot
altogether exclude from view the question of comparative value, as
between him and his now successful and overbearing rivals, the Greek
tragedians. For we are not to expect that of the total studies, at
least of Oxford and Cambridge, any larger share, speaking generally,
can hereafter be given to Greek poetry, as a whole, than has heretofore
been so bestowed. It is rather a question whether there should be some
shifting, or less uniformity, in the present distribution of time and
labour, as among the different claimants within that attractive field.
I do not dispute the merits of the tragedians as masters in their noble
art. As long as letters are cultivated among mankind, for so long
their honours are secure. I do not question the advantage of studying
the Greek language in its most fixed and most exact forms, which they
present in perfection; nor their equal, at least, if not greater value
than Homer, as practical helps and models in Greek composition. But,
after all allowances on these, or on any other score, they cannot,
even in respect of purely poetic titles, make good a claim to that
preference over Homer, which they have, nevertheless, extensively
enjoyed. I refer far less to Æschylus than to the others, because
he seems more to resemble Homer not only in majesty, but in nature,
reality, and historical veracity: and far less again to Sophocles, than
to Euripides. But it may be said of them, generally, though in greatly
differing degrees, that while with Homer everything is pre-eminently
fresh and genuine, with them, on the contrary, this freshness and
genuineness, this life-likeness, are for the most part wanting. We
are reminded, by the matter itself, of the masks in which the actors
appeared, of the mechanical appliances with the aid of which they
spoke. The very existence of the word, ἐκτραγῳδεῖν,[9] and other[10]
like compounds, shows us that, in the Greek tragedy, human nature and
human life were not represented at large; they were got up; they were
placed in the light of certain peculiar ideas, with a view to peculiar
effects. The dramas were magnificent and also instructive pictures, but
they taught, as it were, certain set lessons only: they were pictures
_sui generis_, pictures marked with a certain mannerism, pictures
in which the artist follows a standard which is neither original,
nor general, nor truly normal. Let us try the test of an expression
somewhat kindred in etymology: such a word as ἐξομηροῦν would carry
upon its face a damning solecism. Again, let us mark the difference
which was observed by the sagacity of Aristotle.[11] With the speeches
in the Iliad, he compares the speeches in the tragedians; those most
remarkable and telling compositions, which we have occasion so often to
admire in Euripides. But, as he says, the Characters of the ancients,
doubtless meaning Homer, speak πολιτικῶς, those of the moderns,
ῥητορικῶς. I know no reason why the speeches of Achilles should not be
compared with the finest passages of Demosthenes: but no one could make
such a comparison between Demosthenes and the speeches, though they are
most powerful and effective harangues, which we find in the Troades,
or the Iphigenia in Aulide. This contrast of the earnest and practical
with the artificial, runs, more or less, along the whole line which
divides Homer from the tragedians, particularly from Euripides.
When we consider the case in another point of view, and estimate these
poets with reference to what they tell, and not to the mere manner of
their telling it, the argument for assigning to Homer a greater share
of the attention of our youth, becomes yet stronger. For it must be
admitted that the tragedians, especially the two later of the three,
teach us but very little of the Greek religion, history, manners,
arts, or institutions. At the period when they wrote, the religion of
the country had become political or else histrionic in its spirit,
and the figures it presented were not only multiplied, but were also
hopelessly confused: while morals had sunk into very gross corruption,
of which, as we have it upon explicit evidence, two at least of them
largely partook. The characters and incidents of their own time, and
of the generations which immediately preceded it, were found to be
growing less suitable for the stage. They were led, from this and other
causes, to fetch their themes, in general, from the remote period of
the heroic or pre-historic ages. But of the traditions of those ages
they were no adequate expositors; hence the representations of them
are, for the most part, couched in altered and degenerate forms. This
will be most clearly seen upon examining the Homeric personages, as
they appear in the plays of Euripides. Here they seem often to retain
no sign of identity except the name. The ‘form and pressure,’ and also
the machinery or physical circumstances of the Greek drama, were such
as to keep the tragedians, so to speak, upon stilts, while its limited
scope of necessity excluded much that was comprised in the wide circle
of the epic action; so that they open to us little, in comparison with
Homer, of the Greek mind and life: of that cradle wherein lie, we are
to remember, the original form and elements, in so far as they are
secular, of European civilization.
If I may judge in any degree of the minds of others by my own
experience, nothing is more astonishing in Homer, than the mass of
his matter. Especially is this true of the Iliad, which most men
suppose to be little more than a gigantic battle-piece. But that poem,
battle-piece as it is, where we might expect to find only the glitter
and the clash of arms, is rich in every kind of knowledge, perhaps
richest of all in the political and historical departments. It is
hardly too much to say, in general, that besides his claims as a poet,
Homer has, for himself, all the claims that all the other classes
of ancient writers can advance for themselves, each in his separate
department. And, excepting the works of Aristotle and Plato, on either
of which may be grafted the investigation of the whole philosophy of
the world, I know of no author, among those who are commonly studied
at Oxford, offering a field of labour and inquiry either so wide or so
diversified, as that which Homer offers.
But, if Homer is not fully studied in our universities, there is no
adequate consolation to be found in the fact, that he is so much read
in our public schools.
I am very far indeed from lamenting that he is thus read. His free and
genial temperament gives him a hold on the sympathies of the young.
The simple and direct construction of almost all his sentences allows
them easy access to his meaning; the examination of the sense of single
words, so often requisite, is within their reach; while it may readily
be believed that the large and varied inflexions of the Greek tongue,
in his hands at once so accurate and so elastic, make him peculiarly
fit for the indispensable and invaluable work of parsing. It may be,
that for boyhood Homer finds ample employment in his exterior and
more obvious aspects. But neither boyhood nor manhood can read Homer
effectively for all purposes at once, if my estimate of those purposes
be correct. The question therefore is, how best to divide the work
between the periods of life severally best suited to the different
parts of it.
It is, indeed, somewhat difficult, as a general rule, beneficially and
effectively to use the same book at the same time as an instrument for
teaching both the language in which it is written, and the subject
of which it treats. What is given honestly to the one purpose, will
ordinarily be so much taken or withheld from the other. For the one
object, the mind must be directed upon the thought of the author; for
the other, upon the material organ through which it is conveyed; or,
in other words, for the former of these two aims his language must be
regarded on its material, for the latter on its intellectual, side.
The difficulty of combining these views, taken of necessity from
opposite quarters, increases in proportion as the student is young,
the language subtle, copious, and elaborate, the subject diversified
and extended. In some cases it may be slight, or, at least, easily
surmountable; but it is raised nearly to its maximum in the instance
of Homer. There are few among us who can say that we learned much of
the inward parts of Homer in our boyhood; while perhaps we do not
feel that our labours upon him were below the average, such as it may
have been, of our general exertions; and though other generations
may greatly improve upon us, they cannot, I fear, master the higher
properties of their author at that early period of life. Homer, if
read at our public schools, is, and probably must be, read only, or in
the main, for his diction and poetry (as commonly understood), even
by the most advanced; while to those less forward he is little more
than a mechanical instrument for acquiring the beginnings of real
familiarity with the Greek tongue and its inflexions. If, therefore,
he is to be read for his theology, history, ethics, politics, for his
skill in the higher and more delicate parts of the poetic calling, for
his never-ending lessons upon manners, arts, and society, if we are to
study in him the great map of that humanity which he so wonderfully
unfolds to our gaze,--he must be read at the universities, and read
with reference to his deeper treasures. He is second to none of the
poets of Greece as the poet of boys; but he is far advanced before them
all, even before Æschylus and Aristophanes, as the poet of men.
But no discussion upon the general as well as poetical elevation
of Homer, can be complete or satisfactory without a more definite
consideration of the question--What is the historical value of his
testimony? This is not settled by our showing either his existence, or
his excellence in his art. No man doubts Ariosto’s, or Boiardo’s, or
Virgil’s personality, or their high rank as poets; but neither would
any man quote them as authorities on a point of history. To arrive at
a right view of this further question, we must be reasonably assured
alike of the nature of Homer’s original intention, of his opportunities
of information, and of the soundness of his text. To these subjects
I shall now proceed; in the meantime, enough may have been said to
explain the aim of these pages so far as regards the more fruitful
study of the works of Homer, the contemplation of them on the positive
side in all their bearings, and the clearing of a due space for them in
the most fitting stages of the education of the youth of England.
FOOTNOTES:
[7] The remark is, I think, Mr. Hallam’s.
[8] This is the σφοδρότης, which Longinus (c. ix.) commends in the
Iliad, but which was perhaps excelled in the Divina Commedia.
[9] Used by Longinus xv. Polyb. vi. 56, 8.
[10] Steph. Lex. iii., 1353.
[11] Aristot. Poet. c. 15.
SECT. 3.--_On the Historic Aims of Homer._
For the purposes of anatomy every skeleton may be useful, and may
sufficiently tell the tale of the race to which it belongs. But when
we come to seek for high beauty and for approaches to perfection, of
how infinite a diversity, of what countless degrees, does form appear
to be susceptible! How difficult it is to find these, except in mere
fragments; and how dangerous does it prove, in dealing with objects, to
treat the whole as a normal specimen, simply because parts are fine,
or even superlative. When, again, we pass onward, and with the body
regard also the mind of man, still greater is the range of differences,
and still more rare is either the development of parts in a degree
so high as to bring their single excellence near the ideal standard,
or the accurate adjustment of their relations to one another, or the
completeness of the aggregate which they form.