For though the argument of an epic poem be far
more diffused and poured out than that of tragedy, yet Virgil,
writing of AEneas, hath pretermitted many things. He neither tells
how he was born, how brought up, how he fought with Achilles, how he
was snatched out of the battle by Venus; but that one thing, how he
came into Italy, he prosecutes in twelve books. The rest of his
journey, his error by sea, the sack of Troy, are put not as the
argument of the work, but episodes of the argument. So Homer laid
by many things of Ulysses, and handled no more than he saw tended to
one and the same end.
Theseus.--Hercules.--Juvenal.--Codrus.--Sophocles.--Ajax.--Ulysses.-
-Contrary to which, and foolishly, those poets did, whom the
philosopher taxeth, of whom one gathered all the actions of Theseus,
another put all the labours of Hercules in one work. So did he whom
Juvenal mentions in the beginning, "hoarse Codrus," that recited a
volume compiled, which he called his Theseide, not yet finished, to
the great trouble both of his hearers and himself; amongst which
there were many parts had no coherence nor kindred one with another,
so far they were from being one action, one fable.
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