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THE ODYSSEY
THE ODYSSEY HOMER INTRODUCTION
Scepticism is as much the result of knowledge as knowledge is of
scepticism. To be content with what we at present know is for the
most part to shut our ears against conviction; since from the very
gradual character of our education we must continually forget and
emancipate ourselves from knowledge previously acquired; we must set
aside old notions and embrace fresh ones; and as we learn we must
be daily unlearning something which it has cost us no small labour
and anxiety to acquire.
And this difficulty attaches itself more closely to an age in which
progress has gained a strong ascendency over prejudice and in which
persons and things are day by day finding their real level in lieu
of their conventional value. The same principles which have swept
away traditional abuses and which are making rapid havoc among the
revenues of sinecurists and stripping the thin tawdry veil from
attractive superstitions are working as actively in literature as in
society. The credulity of one writer or the partiality of another
finds as powerful a touchstone and as wholesome a chastisement in the
healthy scepticism of a temperate class of antagonists as the dreams
of conservatism or the impostures of pluralist sinecures in the
Church. History and tradition whether of ancient or comparatively
recent times are subjected to very different handling from that
which the indulgence or credulity of former ages could allow. Mere
statements are jealously watched and the motives of the writer form
as important an ingredient in the analysis or his history as the
facts he records. Probability is a powerful and troublesome test; and
it is by this troublesome standard that a large portion of historical
evidence is sifted. Consistency is no less pertinacious and exacting
in its demands. In brief to write a history we must know more than
mere facts. Human nature viewed under an introduction of extended
experience is the best help to the criticism of human history.
Historical characters can only be estimated by the standard which
human experience whether actual or traditionary has furnished. To
form correct views of individuals we must regard them as forming
parts of a great whole--we must measure them by their relation to the
mass of beings by whom they are surrounded; and in contemplating the
incidents in their lives or condition which tradition has handed down
to us we must rather consider the general bearing of the whole
narrative than the respective probability of its details.
It is unfortunate for us that of some of the greatest men we know
least and talk most. Homer Socrates and Shakespere have perhaps
contributed more to the intellectual enlightenment of mankind than
any other three writers who could be named and yet the history of
all three has given rise to a boundless ocean of discussion which
has left us little save the option of choosing which theory or
theories we will follow. The personality of Shakespere is perhaps
the only thing in which critics will allow us to believe without
controversy; but upon everything else even down to the authorship of
plays there is more or less of doubt and uncertainty. Of Socrates we
know as little as the contradictions of Plato and Xenophon will allow
us to know. He was one of the dramatis personae in two dramas as
unlike in principles as in style. He appears as the enunciator of
opinions as different in their tone as those of the writers who have
handed them down. When we have read Plato or Xenophon we think we
know something of Socrates; when we have fairly read and examined
both we feel convinced that we are something worse than ignorant.
It has been an easy and a popular expedient of late years to deny
the personal or real existence of men and things whose life and
condition were too much for our belief. This system--which has often
comforted the religious sceptic and substituted the consolations of
Strauss for those of the New Testament--has been of incalculable
value to the historical theorists of the last and present centuries.
To question the existence of Alexander the Great would be a more
excusable act than to believe in that of Romulus. To deny a fact
related in Herodotus because it is inconsistent with a theory
developed from an Assyrian inscription which no two scholars read in
the same way is more pardonable than to believe in the good-natured
old king whom the elegant pen of Florian has idealized--Numa
Pompilius.
Scepticism has attained its culminating point with respect to Homer
and the state of our Homeric knowledge may be described as a free
permission to believe any theory provided we throw overboard all
written tradition concerning the author or authors of the Iliad and
Odyssey. What few authorities exist on the subject are summarily
dismissed although the arguments appear to run in a circle. "This
cannot be true because it is not true; and that is not true because
it cannot be true." Such seems to be the style in which testimony
upon testimony statement upon statement is consigned to denial and
oblivion.
It is however unfortunate that the professed biographies of Homer
are partly forgeries partly freaks of ingenuity and imagination in
which truth is the requisite most wanting. Before taking a brief
review of the Homeric theory in its present conditions some notice
must be taken of the treatise on the Life of Homer which has been
attributed to Herodotus.
According to this document the city of Cumae in AEolia was at an
early period the seat of frequent immigrations from various parts of
Greece. Among the immigrants was Menapolus the son of Ithagenes.
Although poor he married and the result of the union was a girl
named Critheis. The girl was left an orphan at an early age under
the guardianship of Cleanax of Argos. It is to the indiscretion of
this maiden that we "are indebted for so much happiness." Homer was
the first fruit of her juvenile frailty and received the name of
Melesigenes from having been born near the river Meles in Boeotia
whither Critheis had been transported in order to save her
reputation.
"At this time" continues our narrative "there lived at Smyrna a man
named Phemius a teacher of literature and music who not being
married engaged Critheis to manage his household and spin the flax
he received as the price of his scholastic labours. So satisfactory
was her performance of this task and so modest her conduct that he
made proposals of marriage declaring himself as a further
inducement willing to adopt her son who he asserted would become
a clever man if he were carefully brought up."
They were married; careful cultivation ripened the talents which
nature had bestowed and Melesigenes soon surpassed his schoolfellows
in every attainment and when older rivalled his preceptor in
wisdom. Phemius died leaving him sole heir to his property and his
mother soon followed. Melesigenes carried on his adopted father's
school with great success exciting the admiration not only of the
inhabitants of Smyrna but also of the strangers whom the trade
carried on there especially in the exportation of corn attracted to
that city. Among these visitors one Mentes from Leucadia the
modern Santa Maura who evinced a knowledge and intelligence rarely
found in those times persuaded Melesigenes to close his school and
accompany him on his travels. He promised not only to pay his
expenses but to furnish him with a further stipend urging that
"While he was yet young it was fitting that he should see with his
own eyes the countries and cities which might hereafter be the
subjects of his discourses." Melesigenes consented and set out with
his patron "examining all the curiosities of the countries they
visited and informing himself of everything by interrogating those
whom he met." We may also suppose that he wrote memoirs of all that
he deemed worthy of preservation. Having set sail from Tyrrhenia and
Iberia they reached Ithaca. Here Melesigenes who had already
suffered in his eyes became much worse; and Mentes who was about to
leave for Leucadia left him to the medical superintendence of a
friend of his named Mentor the son of Alcinor. Under his hospitable
and intelligent host Melesigenes rapidly became acquainted with the
legends respecting Ulysses which afterwards formed the subject of
the Odyssey. The inhabitants of Ithaca assert that it was here that
Melesigenes became blind but the Colophonians make their city the
seat of that misfortune. He then returned to Smyrna where he
applied himself to the study of poetry.
But poverty soon drove him to Cumae. Having passed over the Hermaean
plain he arrived at Neon Teichos the New Wall a colony of Cumae.
Here his misfortunes and poetical talent gained him the friendship of
one Tychias an armourer. "And up to my time" continues the author
"the inhabitants showed the place where he used to sit when giving a
recitation of his verses; and they greatly honoured the spot. Here
also a poplar grew which they said had sprung up ever since
Melesigenes arrived."
But poverty still drove him on and he went by way of Larissa as
being the most convenient road. Here the Cumans say he composed an
epitaph on Gordius king of Phrygia which has however and with
greater probability been attributed to Cleobulus of Lindus.
Arrived at Cumae he frequented the conversaziones of the old men
and delighted all by the charms of his poetry. Encouraged by this
favourable reception he declared that if they would allow him a
public maintenance he would render their city most gloriouslv
renowned. They avowed their willingness to support him in the measure
he proposed and procured him an audience in the council. Having made
the speech with the purport of which our author has forgotten to
acquaint us he retired and left them to debate respecting the
answer to be given to his proposal.
The greater part of the assembly seemed favourable to the poet's
demand but one man "observed that if they were to feed Homers they
would be encumbered with a multitude of useless people." "From this
circumstance" says the writer "Melesigenes acquired the name of
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