lieve it wou’d be difficult to perſuade your Lordſhip, That there was a Miracle in the Caſe. That, indeed, wou’d quickly put an end to the Queſtion: For were we really of the ſame Opinion, as the Ancients, that Homer was inſpired from Heaven; that he ſung, and wrote as the Prophet and Interpreter of the Gods[1], we ſhould hardly be apt to wonder: Nor wou’d it ſurprize us much, to find a Book of an heavenly Origin without an Equal among human Compoſitions: to find the Subject of it equally uſeful and great, the Stile juſt, and yet ſublime, the Order both ſimple and exquiſite, to find the Sentiments natural without lowneſs, the Manners real, and withal ſo extenſive, as to include even the Varieties of the chief Characters of Mankind; we ſhou'd expect no leſs, conſidering whence it came: And That I take to have been the Reaſon, why none of the Ancients have attempted to account for this Prodigy. They acquieſced, it is probable, in the Pretenſions, which the Poet conſtantly makes to celeſtial Inſtruction, and ſeem to have been of Tacitus’s Opinion, “That it is more pious and reſpectful to believe, than to enquire into the Works of the Gods[2]”.
But, My Lord, the happy Change that has been ſince wrought upon the face of religious Affairs, gives us liberty to be of the contrary
