hen Voltaire was in England, previous to his publication of his
Henriade, he published in English an essay on the epic poetry of the
European nations. In this he both highly praised, and severely attacked,
the Lusiad. In his French editions of this essay, he has made various
alterations, at different times, in the article on Camoens. It is not,
however, improper to premise, that some most amazing falsities will be
here detected; the gross misrepresentation of every objection refuted;
and demonstration brought, that when Voltaire wrote his English essay,
his knowledge of the Lusiad was entirely borrowed from the bold, harsh,
unpoetical version of Fanshaw.

"While Trissino," says Voltaire, "was clearing away the rubbish in
Italy, which barbarity and ignorance had heaped up for ten centuries in
the way of the arts and sciences, Camoens, in Portugal, steered a new
course, and acquired a reputation which lasts still among his countrymen
who pay as much respect to his memory as the English to Milton."

Among other passages of the Lusiad which he criticises is that where
"Adamastor, the giant of the Cape of Storms, appears to them, walking in
the depth of the sea; his head reaches to the clouds; the storms, the
winds, the thunders, and the lightnings hang about him; his arms are
extended over the waves. It is the guardian of that foreign ocean,
unploughed before by any ship. He complains of being obliged to submit
to fate, and to the audacious undertaking of the Portuguese, and
foretells them all the misfortunes they must undergo in the Indies. I
believe that such a fiction would be thought noble and proper in all
ages, and in all nations.

"There is another, which perhaps would have pleased the Italians as well
as the Portuguese, but no other nation besides: it is the enchanted
island, called the Island of Bliss, which the fleet finds in its way
home, just rising from the sea, for their comfort, and for their reward.
Camoens describes that place, as Tasso some years after depicted his
island of Armida. There a supernatural power brings in all the beauties,
and presents all the pleasures which nature can afford, and the heart
may wish for; a goddess, enamoured with Vasco de Gama, carries him to
the top of a high mountain, from whence she shows him all the kingdoms
of the earth, and foretells the fate of Portugal.

"After Camoens hath given loose to his fancy, in the description of the
pleasures which Gama and his crew enjoy