A similar indulgence is due to the poet. The continuity of his imitation permits him, strictly speaking, to touch at one moment on only a single side, a single property of his corporeal objects. But if the happy construction of his language enables him to do this with a single word, why should he not sometimes be allowed to add a second such word? why not a third, if it be worth his while, or even a fourth? As I have said, a ship in Homer is either simply the black ship, or the hollow ship, or the swift ship; at most the well-manned black ship. That is true of his style in general. Occasionally a passage occurs where he adds a third descriptive epithet:[114] Καμπύλα κύκλα, χάλκεα, ὀκτάκνημα, “round, brazen, eight-spoked wheels.” Even a fourth: ἀσπίδα πάντοσε ἐΐσην, καλήν, χαλκείην, ἐξήλατον,[115] “a uniformly smooth, beautiful, brazen, wrought shield.” Who will not rather thank than blame him for this little luxuriance, when we perceive its good effect in a few suitable passages? The true justification of both poet and painter shall not, however, be left to rest upon this analogy of two friendly neighbors. A mere analogy furnishes neither proof nor justification. I justify them in this way. As in the picture the two moments of time follow each other so immediately that we can without effort consider them as one, so in the poem the several touches answering to the different parts and properties in space are so condensed, and succeed each other so rapidly, that we seem to catch them all at once.