Age; and of
Boileau
, the most correct Poet among the Moderns: Not to mention
La Fontaine
, who by this Way of Writing is come more into Vogue than any other Author of our Times.
The Fables I have here mentioned are raised altogether upon Brutes and Vegetables, with some of our own Species mixt among them, when the Moral hath so required. But besides this kind of Fable, there is another in which the Actors are Passions, Virtues, Vices, and other imaginary Persons of the like Nature. Some of the ancient Criticks will have it, that the
Iliad
and
Odyssey
of Homer are Fables of this Nature: and that the several Names of Gods and Heroes are nothing else but the Affections of the Mind in a visible Shape and Character. Thus they tell us, that Achilles, in the first