Action important, 'tis enough that it be the Action of noble and important Persons.
'Tis true, Horace makes mention of Wars: But there is no need for them, 'tis only by accident that they are in the Poem. I might urge, that this is only upon the Account of the Hero who ought to be a Warrior, such as Achilles, Ulysses, and Æneas. Homer, who is cited by Horace in this point, shall testifie it. There is so little War in the Odysseïs, that there is not the least colour to think Horace meant to affirm that Wars were the subject Matter, or a considerable part thereof. The Poet mentions but three Rencounters, that of the Ciconians, that of the Lestrygons, and that of some Ithacans, who were for revenging of their Masters, whom Ulysses had murdered at his House. The recitals of these three Battles, if a Man may call these Adventures so, are made in less than forty Verses in all.
But however 'tis, yet the Return of a Man to his own home, and the Quarrel of two others, that have nothing that is great in themselves, become noble and important Actions; when, in the choice of the Names, the Poet tells us that 'tis Ulysses, who returns back into Ithaca; and that 'tis Achilles and Agamemnon, who fall out with one another at the famous Siege of Troy. 'Tis then these Affairs become Matters of State.
But there are Actions that of themselves are very important, such as the Establishing, or the Downfall, of a State or a Religion. Such then is the Action of the Æneid. There can nothing be imagined more great, noble, and august, since it comprehends both the Civil State and Religion.
There is yet another way of making an Action great, by the Grandeur of the Personages under whose Names we represent it.
This way is to give a higher Idea of these Personages than that which the Readers conceive of all they know to be great. This is performed by comparing the Men of the Poem, with the Men of the present time in which the Poet writes.
Homer says that two Men of his time could not carry the Stone, which Diomedes with ease threw at Æneas; and Virgil says that the Stone Turnus flung at the same Æneas, would have been too heavy a burden for twelve Men in the time of Augustus. In short, according to Homer's Account, who lived one or two Ages after Æneas, and who pretends that Men's strength was abated to a Moiety of what it was before, this same strength may well be reduced to the pitch Virgil would have it ten Ages after. 'Tis by this means these two Poets were willing to render the Subjects of their Poems more great and august by the Strength and Grandeur of their Personages, and by these great Ideas which they super-added to those which the Men of their Times conceived.
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