Homer is fond of comparisons; and of such, particularly, as are drawn from animated nature. The Shield of Hercules also abounds with similes, and they are precisely of this sort. But the frequent use of similitudes is so far from being characteristic of Hesiod, that in the whole Battle of the Giants but one occurs; and only one in the Combat of Jupiter and Typhæus; and in both we look in vain for any comparison drawn from lions, or boars, or vultures. Robinson appears, indeed, conscious of a more crowded and diversified imagery in the Shield than we usually meet with in Hesiod’s poetry; for he is driven to the miserable alternative of supposing that Hesiod may have produced the Shield in his youth, and his other works in his old age. Longinus in the same manner accounts for the comparative quiet simplicity of the Odyssey. The supposition in either case is founded on the erroneous principle, that a poem is beautiful in proportion to the noise and fury of its action, or the accumulation of its ornament. The notion of the genius necessarily declining with the decline of youthful vigour is completely unphilosophical; and is contradicted by repeated experience of the human faculties. It was in his old age that Dryden wrote his “Fables.” As to that portion of the poem which is properly the Shield, and from which the whole piece takes its title, it is self-evident that this must have been borrowed from the description in the Iliad, or the description in the Iliad from this. I do not allude merely to a whole series of verses being literally the same in each; but to long passages of description, bearing so close a resemblance as to preclude the idea of accidental coincidence; such as the bridal procession, the siege, the harvest, and the vintage. Robinson admits the imitation; but thinks the partisans of Homer cannot easily show that Homer was not the copyist. It were, however, easy to decide from internal evidence which is the copy. Where two poems are found so nearly resembling each other as to convey at once the impression of plagiarism, the scale of originality must doubtless preponderate in favour of that which is the more simple in style and invention. Where a poem abounds with florid figures and irregular flights of imagination, it is inconceivable that a _copy_ of that poem should exhibit a chaste simplicity of fancy: but it is highly natural that an imitator should think to transcend his original by the aid of meretricious ornament; that he should mistake bombast for sublimity, and attempt to dazzle and astonish. Of this sort of elaborate refinement a single instance will serve in illustration.