earned him his fame—the dignity of his style, to which Gray alludes so finely:[1]—
"The pride and ample pinion
That the Theban eagle bear,
Sailing with supreme dominion
Through the azure deep of air,"—
its dazzling rapidity and force, sketched no less finely by a modern poetess:[2]—
"Bold,
Electric Pindar, quick as fear,
The race-dust on his cheeks, and clear
Slant startled eyes, that seemed to hear
The chariot rounding the last goal,
To hurtle past it in his soul."
We have recognised in him also the possession of other poetic gifts, with which his critics have not always credited him, and have seen that Pindar is no mere panegyrist, but the exponent of a philosophy of life which he genuinely believed it was his mission to proclaim to his contemporaries. If space permitted, it might be shown that Pindar, in his doctrines of "natural capacity" and "the due measure," anticipated some of the most characteristic and suggestive speculations of later Greek philosophy, and prepared men's minds for such a treatment of moral questions as we find in the 'Republic' of Plato or the 'Ethics' of Aristotle. But it would be hopeless within these limits even to hint at a discussion of these matters. And here we may
- ↑ Gray, Ode V., " The Progress of Poesy."
- ↑ Mrs E. B. Browning.
