He, in Elysium having cast his eye Upon the figure of a youth, whose hair, With purple ribands braided curiously, Hung on his shoulders wond’rous bright and fair, Said: “Virgin, what is he whose heav’nly face Shines past all others, as the morn the night; Whom many marvelling souls, from place to place, Pursue and haunt with sounds of such delight; Whose count’nance (were’t not in the Stygian shade) Would make me, questionless, believe he were A very God?” The learned virgin made This answer: “If thou shouldst believe it here, Thou shouldst not err. He well deserv’d to be Esteem’d a God; nor held his so-much breast A little presence of the Deity, His verse compris’d earth, seas, stars, souls at rest; In song the Muses he did equalize, In honour Phœbus. He was only soul, Saw all things spher’d in nature, without eyes, And rais’d your Troy up to the starry pole.” Glad Scipio, viewing well this prince of ghosts, Said: “O if Fates would give this poet leave To sing the acts done by the Roman hosts, How much beyond would future times receive The same facts made by any other known! O blest Æacides, to have the grace That out of such a mouth thou shouldst be shown To wond’ring nations, as enrich’d the race Of all times future with what he did know! Thy virtue with his verse shall ever grow.” Now hear an Angel sing our poet’s fame, Whom fate, for his divine song, gave that name. ANGELUS POLITIANUS, IN NUTRICIA More living than in old Demodocus, Fame glories to wax young in Homer’s verse. And as when bright Hyperion holds to us His golden torch, we see the stars disperse, And ev’ry way fly heav’n, the pallid moon Ev’n almost vanishing before his sight; So, with the dazzling beams of Homer’s sun, All other ancient poets lose their light. Whom when Apollo heard, out of his star, Singing the godlike act of honour’d men, And equalling the actual rage of war, With only the divine strains of his pen, He stood amaz’d and freely did confess Himself was equall’d in Mæonides. Next hear the grave and learned Pliny use His censure of our sacred poet’s muse. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. 7. cap. 29. Turned into verse, that no prose may come near Homer.