μῆνιν ἄειδε, θεά

καὶ

ἠέλιος δ’ ἀνόρουσε λιπών 15

καὶ τὰ παραπλήσια τούτοις· ἡγεῖται μὲν γὰρ ἐν τούτοις τὰ
ὀνόματα, ἕπεται δὲ τὰ ῥήματα. πιθανὸς ὁ λόγος, ἀλλ’ οὐκ
ἀληθὴς ἔδοξεν εἶναί μοι. ἕτερα γοῦν παράσχοιτ’ ἄν τις παραδείγματα
παρὰ τῷ αὐτῷ ποιητῇ κείμενα ἐναντίως συντεταγμένα
ἢ ταῦτα συντέτακται, καλὰ δὲ οὐχ ἧττον καὶ πιθανά. τίνα 20
οὖν ἐστι ταῦτα;

[99]

sought and which I felt I must attain; and so I gave up the attempt. I may as well, perhaps, touch on that inquiry also, and state the reasons which led me to abandon it, so that I may not be open to the suspicion of having passed it by in ignorance, and not of deliberate choice.

CHAPTER V
NO GRAMMATICAL ORDER PRESCRIBED BY NATURE

Well, my notion was that we ought to follow mother nature to the utmost, and to link together the parts of speech according to her promptings. For example, I thought I must place nouns before verbs: the former, you see, indicate the substance, the latter the accident, and in the nature of things the substance takes precedence of its accidents! Thus we find in Homer:—

The hero to me chant thou, Song-queen, the resourceful man;[102]

and