h' old man may loathe; and I obeyed:

Of all the gods, O father Jove, there's none
Thus given to mischief but thyself alone.
("Iliad," xvi. 97; "Odyssey," xi. 421; "Iliad," ix, 452;
Ibid. iii, 365.)

Our young man is to be taught not to commend such things as these,
no, nor to show the nimbleness of his wit or subtlety in maintaining
argument by finding out plausible colors and pretences to varnish over
a bad matter. But we should teach him rather to judge that poetry is an
imitation of the manners and lives of such men as are not perfectly
pure and unblameable, but such as are tinctured with passions, misled by
false opinions, and muffled with ignorance; though oftentimes they may,
by the help of a good natural temper, change them for better qualities.
For the young man's mind, being thus prepared and disposed, will receive
no damage by such passages when he meets with them in poems, but will
on the one side be elevated with rapture at those things which are well
said or done, and on the other, will not entertain but dislike
those which are of a contrary character. But he that admires and is
transported with everything, as having his judgment enslaved by the
esteem he hath for the names of heroes, will be unawares wheedled into
many evil things, and be guilty of the same folly with those who imitate
the crookedness of Plato or the stammering of Aristotle. Neither must he
carry himself timorously herein, nor, like a superstitious person in
a temple, tremblingly adore all he meets with; but use himself to
such confidence as may enable him openly to pronounce, This was ill
or incongruously said, and, That was bravely and gallantly spoken. For
example, Achilles in Homer, being offended at the spinning out that
war by delays, wherein he was desirous by feats of arms to purchase to
himself glory, calls the soldiers together when there was an epidemical
disease among them. But having himself some smattering skill in physic,
and perceiving after the ninth day, which useth to be decretory in such
cases, that the disease was no usual one nor proceeding from ordinary
causes, when he stands up to speak, he waives applying himself to the
soldiers, and addresseth himself as a councillor to the general, thus:--

Why leave we not the fatal Trojan shore,
And measure back the seas we cross'd before?
(For this and the four following quotations, see
"Iliad," i. 59, 90, 220, 349; ix, 458.)

And