"When a friend inquired of Phidias what pattern he
had formed his
Olympian
Jupiter, he is said to have answered by
repeating the lines of the first Iliad in which the poet represents
the majesty of the god in the most sublime terms; thereby signifying
that the genius of Homer had inspired him with it.
Iliad - Pope
110, of my edition.
68 That is, drawing back their necks while they cut their throats. "If
the sacrifice was in honour of the celestial gods, the throat was
bent upwards towards heaven; but if made to the heroes, or infernal
deities, it was killed with its throat toward the ground."-- "Elgin
Marbles," vol i. p.81.
"The jolly crew, unmindful of the past,
The quarry share, their plenteous dinner haste,
Some strip the skin; some portion out the spoil;
The limbs yet trembling, in the caldrons boil;
Some on the fire the reeking entrails broil.
Stretch'd on the grassy turf, at ease they dine,
Restore their strength with meat, and cheer their souls with
wine."
Dryden's "Virgil," i. 293.
69 --_Crown'd, i.e._ filled to the brim. The custom of adorning goblets
with flowers was of later date.
70 --_He spoke,_ &c.
"When a friend inquired of Phidias what pattern he
had formed his
Olympian
Jupiter, he is said to have answered by
repeating the lines of the first Iliad in which the poet represents
the majesty of the god in the most sublime terms; thereby signifying
that the genius of Homer had inspired him with it.
Those who beheld
this statue are said to have been so struck with it as to have asked
whether Jupiter had descended from heaven to show himself to
Phidias, or whether Phidias had been carried thither to contemplate
the god."-- "Elgin Marbles," vol. xii p.124.
71 "So was his will
Pronounced among the gods, and by an oath,
That shook heav'n's whole circumference, confirm'd."
"Paradise Lost" ii. 351.
72 --_A double bowl, i.e._ a vessel with a cup at both ends, something
like the measures by which a halfpenny or pennyworth of nuts is
sold. See Buttmann, Lexic. p. 93 sq.
