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chapman250

…. Columbæ timidæ. What these doves were, and the whole mind of this place, the great Macedon asking Chiron Amphipolites, he answered: They were the Pleiades or seven Stars. One of which (besides his proper imperfection of being …, i. e. adeo exilis, vel subobscurus, ut vix appareat) is utterly obscured or let by these rocks. Why then, or how, Jove still supplied the lost one, that the number might be full, Athenæus falls to it, and helps the other out, interpreting it to be affirmed of their perpetual septenary number, though there appeared but six. But how lame and loathsome these prosers show in their affected expositions of the poetical mind, this and an hundred others, spent in mere presumptuous guess at this inaccessible Poet, I hope will make plain enough to the most envious of any thing done, besides their own set censures, and most arrogant overweenings. In the 23 of the Iliads (being …) at the games celebrated at Patroclus’ funerals, they tied to the top of a mast …, timidam columbam, to shoot at for a game, so that (by these great men’s abovesaid expositions) they shot at the Pleiades.–CHAPMAN.