The above form the chief grounds of argument used by those who are anxious to disturb our natural belief, as it were, of the integrity of Homer’s poems. On the contrary side, it is asserted, that other untaught poets have arisen, who, without the aid of external culture, have breathed the tenderest and most beautiful thoughts in poetry; and it is also urged, that, granting the sublimity of Homer’s poems as they stand, it is necessary, if we adopt the opponent system, to come to the belief that, in a barbarous age, instead of _one_ being marvellously gifted with poetical powers, there were _many_, a complete race of bards, such as has never been since seen. The objection arising from the ignorance of letters, and want of writing materials, has been considered more formidable; but so much uncertainty attends the account of the introduction of letters into Greece, that it must undoubtedly have been of high antiquity. That the memory of the reciter should be capable of retaining the whole poem does not appear so incredible in those times, when the minds of men were not distracted by the attempt to attain a variety of knowledge; for it is well known, that the constant and sole exercise of a single faculty gives it a great perfection. The great uniformity of style in these poems has been considered as strong internal evidence that they were the production of an individual genius; the same epithets and similes prevail throughout. Interpolation may have occurred, but not sufficiently to affect the authority of the whole. Pindar, and other early poets, speak of Homer as one man, as do also the historians Herodotus and Thucydides. It has, indeed, been maintained by some, that the Odyssey is the work of a different poet, because the images and descriptions evidently belong to a later period than those of the Iliad; and from allusions made to the arts, it appears that they must have made a greater progress than could reasonably have taken place during the life of one man, even granting the supposition that the Iliad was the work of Homer’s youth, and the Odyssey that of his maturer years. This is probably one of the most forcible objections which has been urged against the belief that the Iliad and the Odyssey are the work of one poet. As is often the case, however, in these doubtful questions, where direct evidence cannot possibly be obtained, much may be said on both sides; and the matter must probably ever remain a matter of curious literary speculation. THE EPISTLES OF PHALARIS. The following ancient literary fraud was investigated and exposed by the extraordinary learning and diligence of Dr. Bentley, who, in the year 1697, commenced the famous controversy about the Epistles of Phalaris, and the Fables of Æsop.