of it. Wherever he is, the English catholic priest is the poor man's friend.

It should be mentioned, that, notwithstanding their exile and persecutions, the hearts of the English scholars educated in these foreign colleges remained truly English. This was frequently observed by those, among whom they were domiciliated. During the war, which was closed by the peace of Paris in 1763, every victory which the English gained over the French, was a triumph to the English boys: their superiors were more than once admonished by the magistrates and their friends not to make their joy on these occasions too noisy. The salutary and incontrovertible truth, that one Englishman can, any day, beat two Frenchmen, was as firmly believed, and as ably demonstrated at Douay and St. Omer's, as it could be at Eton or Winchester.

II.

CLASSICAL STUDIES-HOMER-VIRGIL-DEMOSTHENES—

CICERO-DRYDEN-POPE-MODERN ENGLISH POETS.

CLASSICAL literature was, for some years after he quitted Douay college, the delight of the Reminiscent; such it had been even before that time. He distinctly recollects his almost infant admiration of Tasso in Fairfax's translation, and of Homer in Pope's; and that, even then, he felt the splendid invocation, with which Homer introduces his catalogue of the ships, and the noble speech of Sarpédon to Glaucus. At Douay he read the two great epic poems of antiquity in their original language, and then preferred the Roman to the Grecian bard. At a subsequent time he renewed his Greek education under the

late Dr. Harwood,* and then he began to be sensible of the transcendent beauties of the latter.

Homer has since been his favourite author. The sublime conceptions, vivid figures, interesting narratives, but more than all, the exquisite style and perfect common sense of the Mæonian bard, are far above any praise which they can receive in these pages. His work is a prodigy :-we must suppose either that he was preceded by other writers, who had brought poetry to the perfection, or nearly to the perfection, in which we find it in his writings; or that he himself created the poetry of his own immortal work.

It is observable that Herodotust seems to declare for the latter opinion. "As for the gods," these are his words, "whence each of them was descended, or whether "they were always in being, or under what shape or "form they existed, the Greeks knew nothing till very "lately. Hesiod and Homer were, I believe, about four "hundred years older than myself, and no more; and "these are the men who made a theogony for the Greeks ; "who gave the gods their appellations, defined their qual"ities, appointed their honours, and described their "forms. As for the poets, who are said to have lived "before these men, I am of opinion they came after "them." In this passage, Herodotus expresses an opinion that the Grecian theogony was the invention of Homer and Hesiod; but, whoever reflects on its nature, its

* The Greek language appeared to be as familiar to this learned man as the English. An eminent Greek scholar once said, "I don't know why it is so, but I read no Greek author as familiarly as I do "a newspaper."-Did even the Stephenses read Greek as familiarly as we read newspapers?

complication and contrivance, its countless but coherent relations and dependencies, must be sensible that this was impossible.

Even if this opinion were admitted, a further difficulty would press upon us. The poetry of Homer is complete ; the structure of the hexameter is equalled by no other mode of versification in any language; the formation of the phrases, the collocation of the words, the figurative diction, the animation of inanimate nature, whatever else distinguishes poetry from prose, is introduced, in its most perfect mode, into the poems of Homer. The universal opinion of all ages has acknowledged these to constitute the true poetical character, and no succeeding age has improved on any of them. Was he, then, the inventor of them ?-This exceeds human power. Was he prece

ded by other bards, upon whom he refined, and whom he transcendently excelled? Then,-what has become of these antecedent poets?

To solve these difficulties, the Reminiscent begs leave to suggest a conjecture, in which he has sometimes indulged himself; that there existed in central Asia a civilized and powerful nation, in which the Sanscrit language was spoken, and the religion of Brama prevailed; this, the initiated might reconcile, by emblematical explanation, with philosophy; but, in the sense in which it was received by the people at large, it was the rankest idolatry;-that, comparing what the writers on India, Siam, China, and Japan, relate of a celebrated man, whom they severally call Budda, Sommonocoddom, Fohi and Xaha, we have reason to suppose that he was the same person, and a reformer of the Sanscrit creed and ceremonial ;that his reformed system may be called Buddism: that this still prevails in Tartary, China, and numerous islands

in the Indian Archipelago; but that Sanscritism still exists in Hindûstan; that either before or after the Buddistic schism, and not far from the era usually assigned to the fabulous ages, the Sanscritans spread their doctrines and languages, though not their castes, over the countries which lay to their west, so that, in the course of time, they became the religious creed and language both of Greece and Italy; that civilization and the arts and sciences flourished at this period among them; that those, who introduced them into Greece, were called the Pelasgi; that those, who introduced them into Italy, acquired the appellation of Hetruscans; that, by degrees, the Sanscrit was moulded into the Greek language; that from the Greek it degenerated, in Italy, into the Latin; that this state of things continued in Greece, till the irruption of the Dorians and Heraclidæ into Peloponnesus, about eighty years after the Trojan war; and in Italy, until the period usually assigned for the foundation of Rome, when, from some unknown event, the glories of Hetruria were considerably impaired; that, after the settlement of the Dorians and Heraclidæ in Peloponne. sus, but while the former traditionary learning of Greece was still remembered, Homer wrote; that, in the confusion which followed this event, the memory of Homer and the preceding and contemporary poets was lost; and that the minor poets never revived, but that the supereminent merit of Homer buoyed up his strains against the overwhelming waves of time, and restored them to celebrity.

This conjecture receives some countenance from the opinion generally entertained by the ancients, that Homer acquired his knowledge in Egypt, and the Egyptians theirs from India; and from the system of Sir William

Jones* respecting the identity of the Indian, Grecian, and Italian deities :-Among these, if we believe Dr. Milne, t we should include the national deities of China.-It is also said by Sanscrit scholars, that there are strong marks of affinity between the languages of these nations, and that something even which resembles the Greek and Roman metres, is discoverable in Sanscrit poetry.

But, whatever opinions may be formed on the points which have been mentioned, no doubt can be entertained of the supreme merit of the Homeric poems.

In one respect the strong and exquisite delineation of character-Homer has, unquestionably, excelled all other writers. His heroes constitute nearly all the genera into which mankind can be divided; the species of them he left to his followers. Sometimes, however, he descends to these, and then his pencil is equally powerful and distinct. All the principal actors in his poems have the heroic port, and therefore inspire awe; but they are all human, and therefore interest by their successes and misfortunes.

Here, Virgil, miserably fails. With the exception of Dido, and perhaps of Turnus in his latest hour, he has scarcely introduced into the Eneid a personage who either imposes by the grand, or interests by the amiable features of his character. Æneas is worse than insipid : -he disgusts by his fears, his shiverings, and his human sacrifices and, in his interview with Helen, while Troy was on fire, he is below contempt. Amata, however, is

:

* In his excellent dissertation upon this subject in the "Asiatic Researches."

+ See his "Retrospect of the First Ten Years of the Protestant "Mission to China," —an interesting work, printed at the Anglo-Chinese press in Malacca,