with a light reflected directly from Greek constellations. No less often they shine with a light transmitted through several media, but ultimately issuing from the suns of Greece. Pre-eminent by far among the literatures to which we owe a debt stands this body of eternally great creators, who, by the clear beauty of their language, their luminous apprehension, and their simple but magnificent originality, surpass in the aggregate those whom any other nation can assemble. It is no paradox, but a simple historical fact, that the old English writers have had less influence in moulding our modern literature than have Homer and Sophocles, Plato and Demosthenes. “We are all Greeks,” says Shelley, in the preface to his _Hellas_. Whether we will or no, our literature and philosophy, our canons of taste, our ideals of art, are all, in a sense, Greek. * * * * * Greek literature, unlike Latin, and unlike those of modern Europe, was mainly, if not wholly, original. What we have been able to borrow or to find ready-made seems to have developed itself spontaneously in the wonderful genius of Greece. Latin literature has been called—and not without some justice—one vast plagiarism from Greek. But Greek itself is guiltless of plagiarism. Its thoughts, like its exquisite clearness and restraint of style, are almost entirely its own. With unlettered barbarians to north and west of them, with flowery, bombastic, or mystic orientals on the Asiaward side, the Greeks must be credited with a marvellous gift of their own, the instinct for sound judgement and sure taste.