Note 229 — Chapter XXI · GRECIAN EPIC.—HOMERIC POEMS.

It is a memorable illustration of that bitterness which has so much disgraced the controversies of literary men in all ages (I fear, we can make no exception), when we find Pausanias saying that he had examined into the ages of Hesiod and Homer with the most laborious scrutiny, but that he knew too well the calumnious dispositions of contemporary critics and poets, to declare what conclusion he had come to (Paus. ix. 30, 2): Περὶ δὲ Ἡσιόδου τε ἡλικίας καὶ Ὁμήρου, πολυπραγμονήσαντι ἐς τὸ ἀκριβέστατον οὔ μοι γράφειν ἡδὺ ἦν, ἐπισταμένῳ τὸ φιλαίτιον ἄλλων τε καὶ οὐχ ἥκιστα ὅσοι κατ᾽ ἐμὲ ἐπὶ ποιήσει τῶν ἐπῶν καθεστήκεσαν.