The Golden Verses of Pythagoras — with commentary (1917)

A defect which is common to these two poets, and which is even noticeable in the Jerusalem Delivered of Tasso, is, that everything which does not pertain to the part of the celebrated hero, is by its impure, unfaithful, impious nature, governed by the Principle of evil, and as such consigned to eternal damnation. An insurmountable barrier separates the personages and makes them not alone enemies, but opposed, as much as good and evil, light and darkness. However, the passions act unknown even to the poet; the reader is hurried along, he forgets the fatal line of demarcation, and is deceived into becoming interested in Satan, into finding great, beautiful, and terrible, this enemy of mankind; he trusts in Armida, he is moved by her troubles, and seconds with his vows those of a notorious magician, instrument of the Infernal Spirit. Matters go not thus with Homer. The Greeks see in the Trojans, enemies, and not reprobates. Paris is culpable but not impious. Hector is a hero in whom one can be interested without no The Golden Verses of Pythagoras 2shame, and the interest that one devotes to him reflects upon Achilles and can even be increased. The gods are divided; but Venus and Juno, Minerva and Mars, Vulcan and Neptune are of a like nature; and although divided in the epic action, they are none the less venerated by both parties, equal among each other and all equally subject to Jupiter, who excites or checks their resentment. I know not whether any one has already made this observation; but be that as it may, it is very important. One can attain to the sublimity of epopoeia only if like Homer one knows how to oppose the Powers which serve the hero with the Powers which persecute him. For if everything which serves the hero is good, holy, and sacred, and everything which is harmful to him wicked, impious, and reprobate, I do not see the glory of his triumph.

The principal defect in Milton's poem is that his hero succumbs, although he has to combat only the evil things within himself, whilst everything which is good protects him : the poem of Klopstock does not hold the reader's interest, because the perils of his hero are illusory and as soon as he is represented as God, and when he himself knows his divinity, his downfall is absolutely impossible.