Far from adopting the former part of this maxim, I conceive it to be the duty of a poetical translator, never to suffer his original to fall. He must maintain with him a perpetual contest of genius; he must attend him in his highest flights, and soar, if he can, beyond him: and when he perceives, at any time, a diminution of his powers, when he sees a drooping wing, he must raise him on his own pinions.[20] Homer has been judged by the best critics to fall at times beneath himself, and to offend, by introducing low images and puerile allusions. Yet how admirably is this defect veiled over, or altogether removed, by his translator Pope. In the beginning of the eighth book of the Iliad, Jupiter is introduced in great majesty, calling a council of the gods, and giving them a solemn charge to observe a strict neutrality between the Greeks and Trojans:
Ἠὼς μεν κροκόπεπλος ἐκιδνατο πᾶσαν ἐπ’ αίαν·
Ζευς δε θεῶν ἀγορην ποιησατο τερπικέραυνος,
Ἀκροτάτη κορυφη πολυδειραδος Οὐλυμποιο·
Αὐτὸς δέ σφ’ ἀγόρευε, θεοὶ δ’ ἅμα πάντες ἄκουον·
“Aurora with her saffron robe had spread returning light upon the world, when Jove delighting-in-thunder summoned a council of the gods upon the highest point of the many-headed Olympus; and while he thus harangued, all the immortals listened with deep attention.” This is a very solemn opening; but the expectation of the reader is miserably disappointed by the harangue itself, of which I shall give a literal translation.
Κέκλυτέ μευ, πάντες τε θεοὶ, πᾶσαὶ τε θέαιναι,
Ὄφρ’ εἴπω, τά με θυμὸς ἐνὶ στήθεσσι κελεύει·
Μήτε τις οὖν θήλεια θεὸς τόγε, μήτε τις ἄρσην
Πειράτω διακέρσαι ἐμὸν ἔπος· ἀλλ’ ἅμα πάντες