[732] He bears the chief part from 206. to 488. Upon the whole, then, it would seem that Homer had to maintain a complex regard to a variety of objects. First of all there was the relation to observe between Achilles and all the other personages of his poem on both sides of the quarrel. Then in distributing his minor Alps, the other prime or distinguished Greek warriors, about this great Alp, he had to keep in mind and provide for their relations to one another, as well as to him. Lastly, he had to carry Hector and the Trojans so high, that to overcome their chief should be his crowning exploit, and yet so low, that they should not stand inconveniently between the Greeks and the view of such national heroes as Ulysses, Diomed, Ajax, and Agamemnon. Like Jupiter on Ida[733], from none of these objects has he ever removed his bright and watchful eye; for all of them he has made a provision alike deliberate and skilful. [733] Il. xvi. 644. It only remains to consider the outline of the plot in reference to the Providential Government of the world, and the administration of retributive justice; a subject which has been ably handled by Mr. Granville Penn[734]. [734] In his ‘Examination of the Primary Argument of the Iliad.’ Dedicated to Lord Grenville. 1821. I am not able to admit that broad distinction, which is frequently drawn between the provision made for satisfying this great poetical and moral purpose in the Iliad and in the Odyssey respectively. In each I find it not only remarkable, but even elaborate. In each poem, Homer exhibits, above all things else, one chosen human character with the amplest development. But diversity is the key-note of the development in the Odyssey, grandeur or magnitude in the Iliad. The hurricane-like forces, that abound in the character of Achilles, entail a greater amount of aberration from the path of wisdom. But there is not wanting a proportionate retributive provision. Ulysses, after a long course of severe discipline patiently endured, has awarded to him a peaceful old age, and a calm death, in his Ithaca barren but beloved, with his people prospering around him. Achilles, on the other hand, is so loaded with gorgeous gifts that, wonderful as is their harmony in all points but one, that one is the centre. He has not the same unfailing and central solidity of moral equipoise. In himself gallant, just, generous, refined, still indignity can drive him into an extremity of pride and fierceness, which call for stern correction. Hence it comes about that, while the adversity of Ulysses is the way to peace, the transcendent glory of Achilles is attended by a series of devouring agonies; the rival excitements of fierce pain and fiercer pleasure accompany him along a path, which soon and suddenly descends into the night of dismal death. Alike in the one case and in the other, the balance of the moral order is preserved; and that Erinūs, who, in so