The journal of a voyage to Lisbon / [Henry Fielding].

  • Henry Fielding
Date:
1755
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The journal of a voyage to Lisbon / [Henry Fielding]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    193/296 (page 179)
    thankfgiving, for the many wonderful bleffings with which a fea-faring life overflows. * '4. %r L J • . * ' « For my own part, however whim- fical it may appear, I confefs, I have thought the ftrange ftory of Circe in the Odyffey, no other than an ingenious allegory; in which Homer intended to convey to his countrymen the fame kind of in ft ruction, which we intend to com¬ municate to our own in this digreffion. As teaching the art of war to the Greeks, was the plain defign of the Iliad ; fo was teaching them the art of navigation the no lefs manifeft intention of the Qdyfley. For the improvement of this, their fituation was mo ft excel¬ lently adapted ; and accordingly we find Thucydides, in the beginning of his hi- ftory, confiders the Greeks as a fet of pirates, or privateers, plundering each other by Jea. This being probably the firft inftitution of commerce before the Ars Cauponaria was invented, and .mer¬ chants, inftead of robbing, began to 16- cheat